


Rise Like the Bright Morning Stars

by Euphorion



Series: Polyamory [6]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Anal Fingering, Angst, Aromantic Character, Asexual Character, Bisexual Male Character, Blow Jobs, Cunnilingus, Depression, F/M, Hand Jobs, M/M, Multi, Rimming, aromantic momoi, asexual kagami, bisexual aomine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-20
Updated: 2015-05-25
Packaged: 2018-03-25 00:42:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 44,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3790234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Euphorion/pseuds/Euphorion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>The only sound was cloth against cloth as Kuroko shifted. He didn’t look at Aomine, or sit up, just flung out a hand in what could have been a beckoning gesture.</i>
</p><p>  <i>Aomine crossed to him, settling as gently as he could on the futon at his side. </i></p><p>  <i>“S’my head,” Kuroko said, barely above a whisper. “Migraine, this—happens, sometimes.”</i></p><p>  <i>His eyes were closed tight enough to whiten the skin around them. His lashes—darkened, usually, with tricks he got from Kise—were the pale, delicate blue of his hair. Aomine had no idea what to do with his hands.</i></p><p>  <i>“This is why you skipped practice?”</i></p><p>  <i>Kuroko nodded, and then winced, and then laughed, softly, at himself. “Yeah,” he said. “Too bright.”</i></p><p>  <i>Aomine frowned at him. “The gym? It’s no brighter than the rest of school—“</i></p><p>  <i>“Not the gym,” Kuroko said, and his lips curled up at the edges. “You.”</i></p><p>+</p><p>The penultimate story in the Polyamory series, centered around Aomine and his extremely complicated relationship to literally everyone else. Begins at Teiko, will end during the Winter Cup finals.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Tetsu?” Aomine called, kicking off his shoes. “You here? Your door was unlocked.”

“In here,” came the muffled reply, and Aomine wandered through the dark rooms of Kuroko’s apartment, curious and a little wary. He’d never been here before—they always hung out at his place—and if Kuroko’s text hadn’t been so mysterious (just ‘come over’ and then an address) he probably would have spent a minute snooping around. He wasn’t entirely convinced Kuroko wasn’t a ghost, or some kind of, of alien, with powers that vanished him when he chose and made him—weirdly captivating when he didn’t.

He was curled up in the center of his futon in the dark, and Aomine lingered in the doorway, frowning at him. “Are you okay?”

The only sound was cloth against cloth as Kuroko shifted. He didn’t look at Aomine, or sit up, just flung out a hand in what could have been a beckoning gesture.

Aomine crossed to him, settling as gently as he could on the futon at his side. 

“S’my head,” Kuroko said, barely above a whisper. “Migraine, this—happens, sometimes.”

His eyes were closed tight enough to whiten the skin around them. His lashes—darkened, usually, with tricks he got from Kise—were the pale, delicate blue of his hair. Aomine had no idea what to do with his hands.

“This is why you skipped practice?”

Kuroko nodded, and then winced, and then laughed, softly, at himself. “Yeah,” he said. “Too bright.”

Aomine frowned at him. “The gym? It’s no brighter than the rest of school—“

“Not the gym,” Kuroko said, and his lips curled up at the edges. “You.”

Aomine stared at him. “Wh-what do you mean?”

Kuroko’s eyes were still closed, and without them for clues to his expression Aomine found he couldn’t stop watching his mouth—the swell of his lower lip where he’d been biting it, maybe, against the pain; the slow spread of his widening smile before he answered. “Such a shame,” he murmured, “that you’ll never be able to see yourself play. It’s beautiful, Aomine-kun. You burn so bright.”

Aomine swallowed. “O-of course I’ll be able to see myself,” he said, “I’m gonna be the best basketball player in Japan, they’ll never _stop_ showing my games on TV.”

Kuroko reached for him, blindly—touched his knee, his shoulder, before he found his wrist. “Not the same,” he said. He lifted Aomine’s hand and placed it against the bridge of his nose; understanding, Aomine cupped his palm, folding his fingers over his eyes so no light could get in.

Like this, it was even harder to focus on anything but his mouth, see anything but the way his lips parted in relief. He let out a tiny, pleased sigh, and Aomine swallowed hard.

They stayed still, listening to Aomine’s heartbeat—because Kuroko _must_ be able to hear it, slamming away, ricocheting off the walls in the silence, must be able to feel it pulsing in Aomine’s fingertips where they rested lightly on his skin—until Aomine cleared his throat. “Tetsu, do—do you need anything?” he asked, feeling awkward, feeling—not good enough for whatever this was, whatever Kuroko was trusting him with. “Water, or.”

“Nn,” Kuroko said, more a sigh then a word. “It just has to pass.”

“S-so,” said Aomine, “why’d you text me?”

It sounded—ungrateful, like he didn’t want to be here, and Aomine winced at himself, trying to figure out how to soften it, convey some of the—confusing shit he was feeling, about as far away from not wanting to be here as possible. He resettled his hand over Kuroko’s eyes and slid his thumb along his cheekbone, gentle, daring.

Kuroko was silent for a long moment, and then he said, “I didn’t go to practice, but I still wanted to see you.”

Aomine licked his lips, and—in unconscious echo—Kuroko did, too, a quick flicker of tongue. It drew Aomine in and down—the angle was so weird, did he cup his jaw, or. And. He’d, he’d never kissed anyone but Momoi, but, god, he _wanted_ —

“Aomine-kun?” Kuroko asked, thready, nervous, his breath against Aomine’s mouth, and Aomine jolted back too quickly, his hand slipping off Kuroko’s eyes a little. Kuroko made a tiny noise of protest and Aomine gave it up as a bad job altogether, taking his hand away and folding it under his leg and wondering if he’d ever quite forget the heat of Kuroko’s skin, the flutter of his lashes against his palm.

“I,” he said. “I’m glad. That you did. Do.” Fuck, what the hell did he say?

He should have kissed him. He should have—but the moment, somehow, had passed, even though nothing had really changed. Kuroko sighed and curled towards him, pulling a pillow down over his head. “Stupid,” he said softly.

“Yeah,” said Aomine fervently.

“Not you,” said Kuroko, “me.” He swallowed—Aomine saw the bob of his throat. “You don’t have to stay.”

“No, I will!” Aomine snapped, too-loud, and then wanted to punch himself in the face. “I—I want to. Please.”

Kuroko uncurled, just a little—a tiny relaxation of his shoulders—and slid his hand so the backs of his knuckles pressed against Aomine’s knee. “Thanks,” he said.

Aomine nodded, and then rolled his eyes at himself and said, “Yeah.”

He waited, unmoving. After a minute he let his hand rest on his knee, too, his fingertips just brushing the back of Kuroko’s hand.

Eventually Kuroko’s breathing deepened. He stretched further out, his grip on the pillow over his head loosening. Aomine hesitated before lifting it carefully off him, worried that he wouldn’t be able to breathe. 

Kuroko’s face was relaxed—his mouth gone slack, the pain line between his eyebrows easing. His hair was damp with sweat the way it was after practice, a little wild around his ears like he’d been tossing and turning. Aomine took a long, silent breath and then smoothed it down. “I’ve never,” Aomine started, and then stopped when Kuroko shifted, turning, a little, toward his hand.

When his heartbeat had slowed again Aomine continued, softer, “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing, but. I wanted to see you, too.” He ran the backs of his knuckles down Kuroko’s jaw. “Always do. You gotta—you gotta know that.”

Kuroko breathed in, breathed out, and Aomine stared at the dark.

+

He lay on his back on the roof of Teiko, staring at the sky. “Oi,” he said, “How do you ask someone out?”

Momoi peered down at him, raising her eyebrows. “Maybe not the best person to ask, Dai-chan,” she said mildly.

Aomine sat up as she settled next to him, handing him a drink. “Sure,” he said, “but like—you must know the theory.”

“About as well as you do,” she said tartly. “Ask Kise.”

Aomine shook his head. “I would,” he said slowly, “if I wanted to know how to ask out _girls_.”

Momoi cocked her head at him. “Deeply ironic, but totally fair.” She watched him for another minute, and then said, “So this is about Kuroko.”

Aomine looked away.

“You could always make him chocolates,” Momoi suggested wickedly. There was something a little weird about her tone, though, and when he glanced at her she wouldn’t quite meet his eyes.

Aomine blinked at her. “Satsuki.”

She brushed her hair behind her ear and gave him a sideways, shifty sort of look, her lip trapped between her teeth.

He poked her in the knee. “You _jealous?_ ” The thought was a surprisingly nice one, and he smirked at her.

She rolled her eyes at him. “Not the way you think.” She turned her face upward, closing her eyes against the sun. “I’m jealous of you wanting to date someone. It’s—it’s not gonna happen for me,” she said, “and I was starting to think maybe it wouldn’t happen for you, either, that we could just—keep on like we are.”

He frowned at her. “We can,” he said, knocking their shoulders together.

She took a breath and looked at him. “Maybe,” she said. “Maybe. If Tetsu-chan’s okay with it.” She made a face. “Not sure I like being conditional.”

Aomine scowled harder. “You’re _not_ ,” he insisted. “Hell, Satsuki, we don’t even know if he’ll say yes.”

She laughed at him, then, breathless and sad, and he pulled her hard against his side.

+

He decided the best plan was just to be straightforward and direct, met his own eyes in the mirror and repeated _hey, you want to go out sometime_ over and over like every romance movie cliché.

The problem was that Kuroko was never fucking alone. The rest of the Miracles hovered around their sixth man like he was a goddamn mother hen.

Kise was the biggest offender—which made sense; Kuroko was supposed to be his trainer and Kise was so deep in puppy-love with him it made Aomine want to kick him in the head.

Kise was—fucking _impressive_ , mostly. He had the craziest learning curve Aomine had ever seen outside of himself—it was maybe even better than his own, because Kise could actually make Aomine sweat and he’d never even touched a basketball before he came to Teiko. If he’d had Aomine’s raw talent, he might someday surpass him, but his talent lay in copying, not blazing any kind of new trail.

He was also extremely dedicated, extremely annoying, and extremely hot. It was a combination that drove Aomine nuts, because he was always all of those things but he was also all of those things by turns, like he was stepping into a role for the day, and no one could figure out how to get him to switch. On his dedicated days Aomine had nothing but respect and friendship for him—those were the days they could truly match up, the days where—yes, Aomine won, but at least he had to fight for it. On his annoying days he just wanted Kise to go away—stop touching, stop flirting, stop preening and smiling for cameras only he could see. And on his hot days—

On his hot days he was confident as hell, and Aomine didn’t really want him to stop touching and flirting at all.

Today was definitely one of his annoying days, though, and Aomine knew Kuroko knew it, too—saw him try and slip out from under Kise’s arm several times, with varying degrees of success. When Kise lingered with them after practice, Aomine caught the back of his jersey and tugged him away from Kuroko for a minute. “Oi,” he said. 

Kise blinked innocently at him. “Aominecchi?”

Aomine scowled at him. “Lay off, will you?”

Kise licked his lips. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Aomine sighed. “I’m serious,” he said, and he saw something in his tone get through to Kise, because his stance shifted a little. “Tetsu won’t tell you to fuck off himself, so. Give him a little space, yeah?”

Kise narrowed his eyes at him. “Same goes for you,” he pointed out.

Aomine almost said, _no, it doesn’t, because he wants me here_ , but it was a little cruel. He just waited, staring, until Kise shifted, until he ran a hand through his hair and sighed, “fine,” until he’d slouched away, pouting, and left the two of them alone.

“Thanks,” said Kuroko from his side, and Aomine jumped and cursed, pressing a fist to his heart. Kuroko grinned at him, delighted with himself, and all of Aomine’s nerves slammed back into his chest. He nodded, feeling his cheeks heat, and ducked Kuroko’s gaze when he looked at him curiously.

“Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said, at the same time that Aomine said, “Tetsu.”

Kuroko crinkled his eyes at him and passed him the basketball he’d been spinning between his hands. “You go.”

Aomine caught the ball. “Okay, um,” he said. “I’ve—been meaning to ask you something.”

He dribbled the ball between his legs, easy, practiced, as Kuroko watched him, stretching. He was already so much more toned than when Aomine had first met him, lean muscle shifting under his skin, but still so small, so graceful. “Oh?” he asked.

Aomine licked his lips. “Yeah,” he said. “Maybe I’m, like. Totally reading the situation wrong, or whatever, but.” He swallowed, and lobbed the ball mostly at random toward the net, all of his attention focused on the boy at his side. “Would you want to go out sometime? Like. On a date.”

The basketball ricocheted off the rim of the hoop. Kuroko blinked at Aomine as it hit the floor. “You missed,” he said, almost absently, though he was drifting closer.

Aomine scowled at him. “I was distracted. Obviously!”

Kuroko shook his head, but there was a happiness in his eyes that Aomine had never seen. “A real ace should make the shot no matter what,” he said, teasing and serious at once, shades of Akashi in his voice. The basketball rolled to his feet, and he picked it up. Close enough, now, he handed it to Aomine. “Try again.”

“Tetsu,” Aomine complained, confused and nervous and annoyed, “you didn’t answer—“

“Try again,” Kuroko repeated, a little shaky, a little commanding, and Aomine took a breath, managed to tear his eyes away from his face enough to take his stance. He raised his hands, let himself sink, a little, into that space where thinking and feeling merged into one atemporal instinct, let his hands tilt with the weight of the ball, and at the very moment he sent the ball into the air there were fingers at the nape of his neck, tugging him down, and Kuroko was kissing him.

There was a split second where Aomine had absolutely no idea what to do, and then he wrapped his arms around Kuroko and dragged him closer, turned the teasing, hopeful press of their mouths into the kind of kiss he’d been practicing with Momoi, the kiss that he’d _specifically meant_ for this moment, only—he always thought he’d initiate, and there’d be a, a date, first, and—damn it, he’d been trying to do this properly.

“Yes,” Kuroko said breathlessly against his mouth, and it was a yes to a date but it felt—it felt also like a yes to them in general, to this easy, laughing, perfect kiss, to the way they fit together. A yes to Aomine himself. Kuroko had looked at him—had seen him as he was, as he was becoming, and. “Yes,” he said again, pulling back a little to smile at him. “I want that very much.”

Aomine tried to smirk, but his lips were trembling. “Good,” he said instead, and then realized he had no idea where to go from here. “I—when? And, like, how—dinner, or—“

Kuroko stepped back from him, his hand sliding down Aomine’s arm until he could tangle their fingers together. “Walk me home,” he said. “Let’s start there.”

Aomine nodded, grinning helplessly, and followed him into the locker room. “Did I make the shot?”

Kuroko turned to look at him, sidelong. “I don’t know,” he said, his lips curling in a half-smile. “I was distracted. Obviously.”

Aomine crowded him into the corner and kissed him again, Kuroko’s hands toying with the hair at the nape of his neck. “Aomine-kun,” Kuroko breathed in his ear, and—and he never dropped the suffix, even when Aomine started called him Tetsu, even now, even teasing and longing and fond. It was endearing as hell and a little intimidating both, a mark of respect that Aomine swore to himself—his hands wandering up under Kuroko’s jersey—he would always earn.

“I’m just helping you change,” he murmured. He waited for Kuroko to laugh and nod against his shoulder before he continued. They’d already fucked up his plan to move slow and—he probably wouldn’t have been able to stick to it anyway, honestly. There was a weird displaced moment where he skimmed his knuckles up Kuroko’s stomach, subconsciously expecting to encounter the heavy curve of breasts only to find more soft skin and hard muscle. He thumbed over Kuroko’s nipple anyway, experimental, and Kuroko didn’t laugh or push him off but he also didn’t shiver the way Momoi did, just twitched a little and stepped back so Aomine could tug his jersey up over his head. Aomine dropped it to one side before doing the same to his own.

It was new and not new at all, to be standing half-naked in the locker room with this boy, this boy that had snuck up and under Aomine’s skin and directly into his heart without ever passing his brain. This boy that made Aomine want to give up everything he’d ever thought was important to him. This boy who in some strange certain way _mattered_ more than anyone Aomine had ever known.

“Aomine-kun,” said Kuroko, and stepped up to him, sliding his hands up Aomine’s sides. His fingers danced along Aomine’s ribs and over the planes of his back, pulling him close so they were pressed skin to skin, heart to beating heart. “I’m very happy,” he said in Aomine’s ear, and Aomine wrapped his arms around him and held him tight.

+

He’d kind of been assuming that he would—lead, in terms of sex with Kuroko. As much as he’d been assuming anything at all about sex with Kuroko. He knew he was a virgin and he’d sort of been—imagining teaching him, opening his eyes to the wonders of his own body or some shit.

And it’s not that he didn’t. Kuroko was unsure, at first, was inexperienced. But he was also _smart_ , and he seemed to somehow—sense what Aomine liked before Aomine even knew he liked it. Aomine was half convinced he was using his misdirection during sex because everything he did was so fucking—surprising, so new and unexpected and awesome. He’d be so distracted by Kuroko’s lips at his throat that when Kuroko’s fingers wrapped around him he’d gasp and shiver as much out of shock as arousal, and then Kuroko would smirk against his skin and all Aomine could _do_ was hold on, was—trust. It was disorienting and overwhelming and incredibly, impossibly freeing.

“Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said one day, naked and face to face with him in Aomine’s bed, his hair mussed, his cheeks flushed. He trailed a hand down Aomine’s side, drawing circles over his hip, the curve of his ass. “I think I’d like to fuck you.”

Aomine swallowed, his mind going a little blank. “Uh,” he said.

Kuroko smiled at him, eyes warm. He ran his nails forward along the crease at the top of Aomie’s thigh, brushed his knuckles lightly along Aomine’s dick. “Would you like that?”

The thing is—Aomine didn’t think he would, if Kuroko were anyone else. Sex was too much like being on the court, and he never wanted anyone else to be controlling the flow of the game. But—that was what Kuroko was for, and it was the natural extension of the way they had sex anyway. He had nothing to prove.

And—he knew Momoi enjoyed it, knew how much pleasure it gave her, and there was a part of him that was deeply, _intensely_ curious.

He nodded, licking his lips, and Kuroko made a pleased noise and squirmed closer to kiss him before sliding away and onto his feet. Aomine raised his eyebrows at him and Kuroko went red. “Condoms,” he asked, his voice a little laughing.

Aomine licked his lips again, running his eyes over Kuroko’s body. “Top drawer,” he said, and then raised his eyebrows, trying to look confidant and not—too scared, or too eager, or. “Lube, too.”

Kuroko ran a hand through his hair, embarrassed, and crossed to Aomine’s dresser. Aomine flopped over onto his back to watch him. He didn’t want to bring it up but he—didn’t want to not have worked it out, more. “Does it bother you?” he asked. “Satsuki and me.”

Kuroko paused, not looking at him, and then slid the drawer open. “I’m jealous,” he admitted, and Aomine’s heart sank. He sat up a little as Kuroko crossed back to him, supplies in hand. He perched at the end of the bed and raised his eyes to Aomine’s. “I’m jealous that she got to make you feel these things first,” he clarified, and then smiled, small and determined. “But it just makes me want to make you feel them _better_.”

He slid up between Aomine’s legs, and Aomine sighed all his relief against his throat. Kuroko kissed him mercilessly, sucking at his tongue, nipping at his lips, centering Aomine’s whole attention on the amazing wet cleverness of his mouth so that when his slick fingers slid back behind Aomine’s balls Aomine was taken too off-guard to tense up. 

“Oh,” said Aomine, disgruntled, because it mostly felt—weird, not good or bad, maybe a little uncomfortable, and Kuroko let out a little sigh through his nose and wriggled back down Aomine’s body. He pressed kisses to his ribs, to his hips, flickered the tip of his tongue against the tip of Aomine’s dick, and Aomine arched, gasping, and Kuroko worked his finger in deeper. He kept up a strange, awkward kind of rhythm, almost-but-never-quite- _enough_ of his mouth on Aomine’s dick, almost-but-never-quite- _enough_ friction, and Aomine fisted his hands in the sheets and snapped, “A-another—“ and the Kuroko was working him open, pressing open-mouthed kisses down his dick, fingers twisting, breath hot against Aomine’s shivering skin, and then his tongue was sliding in beside his fingers, his other hand wrapped around Aomine’s dick and Aomine was—gone.

When he pried open his eyes Kuroko was sitting up between his knees, looking extremely pleased with himself. “Good?” he asked, smug.

“Shut up,” said Aomine, his lips twisting, and reached out to pull him close.

“Your lube tastes terrible,” Kuroko said against his jaw.

“Sorry, your highness,” Aomine muttered back, carding his fingers through Kuroko’s hair. “It’s cherry, Satsuki likes it.”

Kuroko shook his head. “Vanilla, for me,” he mumbled, and yawned.

Aomine’s whole body was warm, was light, was trembling. “Noted,” he murmured, and only Kuroko would know that came out so goddamn fond.

+

It was a weird, living with the knowledge that he was just honestly better than the rest of his team.

Every team had someone like him, he’d figured at the beginning. That’s what an ace was—someone who was good at everything. Better than everyone else at everything. Someone who carried the team to victory. 

Only—looking around, most teams didn’t. They had aces, sure, who were powerful, who could play any position. But often their power came _from_ their versatility, and there would be other people on their team who would be better at their individual skill. 

Like the Miracles had been at first, before Aomine had learned to—do whatever he could do, turn off his mind completely, sink wholly into his body to the point where thought became movement before it was thought at all.

“It’s called the Zone,” Momoi told him one day over lunch. “It just means you’re reaching your potential before they are, that’s all.”

It sounded simple, when she said it. Just a thing he could do, not what it made him into. Not what it made others think of him. None of the stares, the resentment, the muttered comments behind his back from teammates who had styled themselves his equals, his peers.

He was learning—slowly, _maddeningly_ —that he had no peers at all.

Kise was usually a welcome respite from their snide comments. He was arrogant enough to still count himself as on Aomine’s level, for one thing, which—even though he wasn’t—was still somehow a relief. But Kise was acting off for other reasons, ever since Aomine had sent him away, ever since he’d asked Kuroko out.

Which. Aomine just wanted to shake him, tell him to get over it, go back to being dedicated and obnoxious and hot and not. Sad.

“I would talk to him about it,” he complained, “but what the fuck would I say? I know you have a giant crush on my boyfriend but he’s dating me, so get over it and go back to being my friend?”

Momoi wrinkled her nose at him. She was perched on the end of his bed, tugging on her shoes. “Yeah, I don’t think that’d go over well.”

Aomine sighed. “It sucks,” he said shortly. “It _all_ fucking sucks.”

Momoi rolled her eyes. “Stop being a baby, Dai-chan. Just hang out with him.”

Aomine glared at her. “Fine,” he snapped, and tried.

He did try, but it was always weird—everything would be fine, they’d be getting along well, Kise would be giving him the same sidelong looks he always did, flirting with him the same way he always did, comfortable and real, and then—something would switch off, and he’d retreat behind his eyes, fading away from Aomine like he suddenly didn’t know him at all.

And then one night, after he’d left Aomine’s apartment on some flimsy homework excuse, he texted Aomine a picture.

It was himself, shirtless, his cheeks suspiciously flushed. His eyes were dark behind lowered lashes. He was lying down on a bed, his golden hair spread across the pillow, his lips red and parted. One hand was trailing up his chest to his throat, and Aomine swallowed hard. The text accompanying it said _thinking of u_.

The text was followed up almost immediately by three more. Aomine glanced at them— _OH MY GOD, aomenicchi i’m so sorry that wasn’t for you_ —and the stab of jealousy he felt at that—who the fuck _was_ it for?—still wasn’t enough to stop his mind from slipping sideways into a reality where it was, where Kise and him had a relationship not unlike his and Momoi’s, where Kise trailed his long fingers up his throat, bit his lips bloody, blinked slow and dark-eyed and seductive for _him_.

Fuck. He closed his text conversation with Kuroko to slip a hand into his shorts.

He was—admittedly used to thinking about Kise this way. Fantasizing about Kuroko before they were actually dating had always felt kind of improper, but Kise was so—overtly sexual, was so up front with his body, that Aomine felt entirely justified jacking off to him upon occasion. There was even a published photoshoot he could use, if he wanted, but this—this was so much better, this was _directed_ , and he couldn’t stop thinking about Kise following this text up with others, with an artful photo of his abs, his hipbones, those long fingers wrapping around his dick.

Kise’s last text said _fuck oh my god_ , and Aomine was inclined to agree.

When he’d cleaned himself up he texted back _fucking hell kise_ and then _you’re an idiot_ and then _who the hell are you trying to send this shit to,_ because what the fuck, what the fuck.

_i have many fans, aominecchi ;)_

Stupid goddamn winky face. Aomine shook his head and ran a hand over his face.

The next day Kise was in hot-mode more completely than Aomine had maybe ever seen him, and he was absolutely playing it up. Every time Aomine talked to him about anything Kise would deliberately flick his eyes to his mouth, would make sure to tilt his head so the light hit the long, pale stretch of his throat. Aomine started feeling like maybe it hadn’t been a mistake at all, but a deliberate move—like maybe Kise really actually wanted him, like maybe he _could_ have what he had with Momoi.

He finally cornered Kise in the locker room, and the asshole let him, lingering, teasing him with flashes of his ass and his abs.

Aomine stepped up behind him. “You’re doing this on purpose,” he murmured, rather than shouting it like he wanted to. Two could play at this fucking game.

Kise turned, his eyes widening in mock surprise. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Aomine stepped up into his space and saw Kise swallow, saw him step back, his back hitting the lockers, more responsive than Aomine had expected. “Don’t bullshit me,” Aomine breathed, ducking closer. “You’re a fucking tease and you know it.”

Kise tucked his hands in his pockets in an effort to seem casual, tilted his jaw, challenging. “So,” he said. “You gonna do anything about it?”

Aomine leaned in to brush his lips against the skin under Kise’s ear, his heart pounding, his blood up. “You’d like that, huh?” he asked, keeping his voice low. 

Kise jaw tightened further and he was breathing shallowly, like he was trying to keep himself quiet, and, feeling bolder, Aomine took the lobe of his ear between his teeth. He tugged at it, once, and slid his hands under Kise’s jersey to flick his nails over his abs.

Kise gasped, his stomach muscles jumping against Aomine’s palms, and. That was hot as _fuck_ , honestly. Aomine laughed, a little, feeling good, feeling great. “Think how jealous we’ll make Tetsu,” he breathed, because Kuroko jealous of Momoi was _incredible_ in bed. Kuroko jealous of Kise—his trainee, his rival—would be even better.

Kise slid right out from under his hands and into the center of the room, stumbling a little. “Sorry,” he said, his voice weird and loud.

Aomine blinked, surprised, to stare at his hunched back. “Oi,” he said, “it was just a joke, he won’t care—“

Kise turned but still didn’t look at him. “I don’t think that’s true,” he said slowly.

Aomine shrugged, because yeah, it wasn’t, but it also wasn’t a _problem_ that it wasn’t. “Why not?” he asked. “He doesn’t care about me and Momoi.”

Kise twitched like he’d been struck, and Aomine frowned even harder at him. 

“It’s different,” he said.

“Why?” Aomine demanded. “Because she’s a girl? Don’t be ridiculous.”

Kise stared hard at the floor for a long moment, and Aomine shifted on his feet, trying desperately to read his face. He looked, he looked furious, and hurt, and then he made a visible effort to smooth all that away, looked up at Aomine with a blank sort of smile. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have gone so far with it, I was just having some fun.”

Aomine licked his lips. “Kise,” he started, but Kise shook his head as if it was nothing.

“I’m gonna go,” he said shortly. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Aominecchi.” His empty smile got a little more real, and he winked at Aomine. “Or perhaps in your dreams.”

Aomine stared after him, confused and turned on and pissed off, and then he packed up his stuff and went to see Momoi.

“Satsukiiii,” he called, rolling his head against her front door. “Let me innnn.”

She opened the door to raise her eyebrows at him. “What’s the matter with you?”

He stepped in past her and dropped his bag on the floor. “Kise’s giving me blue balls, that’s what’s the matter,” he complained.

“No one who has sex as often as you ever needs to worry about blue balls, Dai-chan,” Momoi responded, crossing her arms.

He stepped up to her, running his fingers up her biceps to her jaw, leaned in to kiss her under the ear, right where he’d—right where he’d had Kise, only a train ride before. He blew out a frustrated breath against her skin. “He basically seduced me all day, and then he just left!”

Momoi ran her nails over the nape of his neck. “Why are you here?”

Aomine scowled and bit her on the earlobe. “I just said why.”

“Yeah, but why are you _here?_ ” Momoi asked, tilting her head to allow him access. “I’m not your only option anymore, and if you want to work our your frustration with Kise surely Kuroko’s a closer match.”

“Hell no,” said Aomine. He pulled back to glare at her, offended. “I’m not gonna have sex with Tetsu while thinking about anyone but Tetsu, Satsuki, come on.” He’s honestly not sure he _could_.

“Okay, okay, sorry.” She smirked at him. “But you figured I wouldn’t care, so long as I got fucked, huh?”

Aomine smirked back, skimming his hands up her sides under her shirt. “Was I wrong?”

“Mmh.” She leaned into him as he undid the clasps of her bra and ran his nails over the lines it left on her back. “Not at all.” She shivered, half natural, half calculated, her breath ghosting over his jaw, and he felt—pulled in two directions, because he was still humming with frustration, could still feel the twitch of Kise’s muscles against his palms, could hear the little hitch and hiss of his breath, but Momoi was soft and urgent and he always—wanted to appreciate her body for what it was, for what she was, take his _time_ with her.

She kissed him, her hand curling hard around the back of his neck, her tongue slipping insistently between his lips. Her other hand slipped down to palm him through his jeans and he thought, _fuck it, let’s go_.

He shoved forward until her back hit the wall and she gasped into his mouth. Aomine closed his eyes, saw Kise against the lockers again, his eyes wide and wanting. He bit down hard on Momoi’s lip and she made a little whining noise, grabbing his ass with both hands and rocking against him. He kept his mouth on the place he’d bitten, gentling it, her flesh swelling a little against his tongue, and then broke off, pulling back to press a hard kiss against her temple. She was breathing hard, tilting her head up so she could nip at his earlobe as she continued to roll her hips against his. “Fuck me,” she breathed, pitching her voice lower in what was a really _startlingly_ good impression of Kise’s cadence. “Fuck me, Aominecchi.”

He swallowed down what was definitely not a moan, fuck you. “Y-you bitch,” he growled, but it came out needy and desperately fond, and she laughed as he slid both hands under her ass and picked her up. He careened a little blindly off walls on the way to the bedroom but he knew this place like the back of his hand and soon he was dropping her onto her bed and peeling himself out of his jeans as she did the same with her shirt, and.

And even with her impression of Kise’s voice in his ears, even with the memory of him fucking _displaying_ himself for Aomine’s gaze, he had to take a minute and just look at her, drink her in.

She leaned back on her hands, shaking her hair loose. She’d started dying it pink the year before—“no one ever believes I’m the manager for you freaks of nature if I have normal hair”—around the same time as they started working out what sex even meant, and the curl and rush of heat in his stomach was inextricable from the feeling of its soft strands against his palms, the startling brilliance of it against his skin, until—until recently, until Kuroko.

The line of it drew his eye down over the curve of her shoulder, across the curl of her collarbone to her breasts, the tips of her hair just beginning to brush her perfect, paler-pink nipples, and he swallowed and palmed himself through his boxers. She chuckled at him, low and knowing, and tucked her hair behind her ear, looking up at him through her lashes. “You want my mouth?” She asked, casual. “Easier to pretend, that way.”

Aomine let his eyes slip closed, let himself imagine the scene in the locker room going a different direction, let himself imagine Kise slipping to his knees. “Shit,” he said, and then there were fingers curling around his wrist, tugging his hand away from his erection, and warm pressure in its place, wet even through the cloth.

 _Fuck_ , he hadn’t even heard her move, and he started to open his eyes but she pulled away and said, “no, no. Don’t ruin the fantasy, idiot,” and he slammed them closed again. He still—he still knew her _mouth_ , though, and the jumble of images against his eyelids paired with the knowing, almost smiling way she teased him was playing hell with his head. 

He wanted—he wanted to believe this is how it would be with Kise, that the little curl of a smile he felt on her lips would be on his, too, that he’d understand that this, this was just like basketball, they could play off each other and rise to each other and _challenge_ each other. He wanted to believe that someday Kise would know what he liked like Momoi did, would know to tug his boxers down slow and dig his teeth into the line of Aomine’s hipbone, would know to wrap a hand around the base of him when he was too worked up because he loved blowjobs but he loved sex more, loved—showing off, loved giving pleasure while he was getting it, driving someone to their peak even as he reached his.

But also—part of him loved that it _was_ Momoi who knew these things, who had figured these things out with him, loved being here with her, and when she wrapped her lips around him and sucked him down it was her name, not Kise’s, that slipped broken from his mouth.

She pulled off him, lingeringly, and sighed. “Aominecchi,” she chided, still in Kise’s cadence, “it’s no fun if you don’t play along.”

He opened his eyes, looking down at her. She had one long-fingered hand wrapped around him, sitting back on her heels, her eyes dark. Her other hand traced down over the pale perfect skin of her throat and chest to toy absently with a nipple, her lips parting, deliberate and slick with spit.

He slipped a hand under her chin and drew her up, kissing her hard. “S’your own damn fault,” he growled against her. “Nobody’s got a mouth like you.”

She gave a self-satisfied hum at the compliment, her hand still on his cock, and he walked her back to the bed, tasting himself in her mouth. He’d been convinced for a week after learning that some people could give themselves blowjobs that he was gonna be among that number; he was probably awesome at blowjobs and he knew what he liked and he was a fucking _athlete_ , if he told his body to do something it did it.

He’d nearly sprained his back trying, and Satsuki had convinced him that maybe no one could blow him like he could blow himself but she was damn willing to try. And it especially wasn’t fucking worth it to hurt himself over, fucking hell, Dai-chan.

But. Even so, he knew his own taste, and there was something heady and amazing about tasting it on her tongue. 

She drew him down onto the bed and he kissed his way down her body, pausing to remind her just how much he loved her tits, and when he pulled the jeans off her long, sleek legs she was already squirming and flushed.

“You getting’ off on thinking about me and Kise?” he asked against her hipbone, his fingers tapping teasingly against the dampness of her underwear.

She slid her nails into his hair and he bit her to keep from shivering as he tugged the underwear down, too. “W-well, he is hot as hell,” she countered, “and it’s not like I can realistically fantasize about him and _me_ —“

“Remind me to show you the picture he sent me,” Aomine said, and licked into her.

After—when he’d fucked her hard enough to jolt her out of her part of the fantasy, too, when her teasing _Aominecchi’s_ turned into breathless _Dai-chan’s_ the way they should be, it wasn’t fucking right for her to be able to keep up the lie if he couldn’t—he did show her, flipping open his phone to the text conversation that had started this whole damn mess.

“Wow,” she breathed, lifting her head from his chest to see better. “He sent you this out of the blue?”

“Yeah,” Aomine grumbled. “Claimed it was a mistake, but then showed off for me all day, and then when I actually confronted him about it he freaked out.”

Momoi raised her eyebrows at him. “What exactly happened?”

Aomine shrugged. “Dunno,” he said shortly, and when she continued to stare he admitted, “I—might have mentioned making Tetsu jealous.”

Momoi rolled her eyes. “Dai-chan.”

“What?” Aomine snapped. “I _told_ him it wasn’t any different from fucking you.”

Momoi ran her hands through her hair, shaking it out over her shoulders. “I imagine he didn’t agree.”

Aomine scowled. “No,” he said, “and I don’t know why. I know he’s like. In love with Tetsu or whatever, but.”

Momoi looked amused. “Kuroko does seem to attract that.” She looked thoughtful. “I think if I could be in love I’d be in love with someone like him, too.”

“Hey,” Aomine objected.

She cocked her head at him. “What?”

“I’m right here,” he pointed out.

She stared at him. “Oh,” she said, and then she laughed. “Oh, Dai-chan, never. I know you too well.”

Aomine shifted, feeling weirdly hurt. “You sayin’ no one who knows me could love me?” He frowned. “You sayin’ Tetsu doesn’t know me?”

Momoi shook her head. “He does,” she said slowly, “but the you he knows is a different one.” She leaned in to kiss him, quick and fond. “I don’t think anyone knows that you but him,” she said, and then pulled away. “It’s late, time to go.”

Aomine got up, ignoring the soreness in his thighs. “Fine,” he said, “but I still don’t understand why Kise thinks it’s so fucking different.”

Momoi shrugged, turning away to fix her sheets. “I don’t know, really,” she said. “But if he insisted, don’t push him. It’ll only go badly for both of you.”

Aomine pulled on his clothes. “It makes no fuckin’ sense,” he muttered. 

“Go home, Dai-chan,” Momoi said firmly, so he did.

+

Things were weird with Kise for a few weeks but he didn’t know how to bring it up and Kise seemed dead set against bringing it up himself so he just—ignored it, and after a while he stopped feeling weird anymore.

Mostly because he started feeling weird about basically everything else.

It wasn’t that he stopped having fun playing basketball. Games were fun. Games were fun because he _won_ games, he and Kuroko won games, and usually there was at least a part of the first quarter—before the opposing team realized who they were up against—where they actually tried to put up a fight. But practice did absolutely nothing for him anymore. What was the point of going, if he wasn’t going to get anything out of it? It wasn’t like any of his teammates actually challenged him anymore.

Even Kise, though he came closer than anyone else. (Akashi didn’t count, because Akashi never condescended to shit like one-on-one matches with his teammates, and Aomine was not crazy enough, yet, to test him.) 

So he—maybe started to skip more than he should, to nap or eat or wander the city alone. Maybe he started seeking out random games of streetball in the desperate hope he’d find some hidden gem somewhere, someone who would actually match up against him and make him work for it.

He came home from wiping the floor with a group of high schoolers to find Kuroko outside his door, frowning at him.

“Tetsu,” he said, surprised, and stepped up to him.

Kuroko stared him down. “Are you avoiding me, Aomine-kun?”

Aomine blinked at him. “Of course not,” he said, and reached out to cup Kuroko’s jaw. “Why would I—“

Kuroko shrugged off his touch. “You haven’t been coming to practice.”

“So?” Aomine demanded. “We can hang out other times, you’re here now, aren’t you—“

“I’m not staying,” Kuroko said coldly, and Aomine tightened his jaw. Kuroko sighed, his expression softening just a little. “It’s really inconsiderate, you know,” he said. 

Aomine frowned at him. “Why?” he asked. “It’s not like I need it, I still hold up my end in games.” He snorted. “More than, I win them for us.”

Kuroko pressed his lips into a thin line. “Basketball’s not about winning on your own,” he said firmly. “You could be working with us, making the rest of us better—“

“Why?” Aomine demanded again, feeling restless and pissed. “They’re all fucking prodigies in their own right, they don’t need me any more than I need them.”

Kuroko stared at him for a long time. Aomine tried to read the expression in his eyes; didn’t like what he found there. Anger, and sorrow, and hurt, and none of it made any sense. “ _I’m_ not a prodigy,” Kuroko said, finally. “And I can’t practice properly without you there.”

Aomine sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “Fine,” he said. “I’ll go this week.” He smirked and leaned down, raising two fingers to lift Kuroko’s jaw. “Anything for you,” he said softly, only a little bit mocking. “Tetsu—“

Kuroko ghosted away from his kiss. “Good,” he said, and walked away.

Aomine watched him go, all nervous angry energy and nothing at his core.

He did start going to practice again and for a while it was better—catching Kuroko’s passes felt as amazing as always, and if he treated practice as an excuse to just hang out with him and do what they did best he could forget the hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach every time someone failed to block his shots. He could grin at his victories anyway and pull Kuroko against his side and take him home, after, lose himself in the taste of his skin.

And then—passing to him at _all_ became a chore. He didn’t have to. Every time he had the ball he knew exactly how to get it into the net, knew that there was no way anyone could stop him, so he started including Kuroko in his plays just for the thrill of playing with him. But it was work and it was risk and he started feeling less and less like it was worth it, like anything at all was worth it.

He never figured out if he was pulling away from Kuroko or if Kuroko was pulling away from him, but his _Aomine-kun’s_ started feeling formal and distancing rather than sweet and endearing. He still kissed Aomine back hard, still teased and tugged at him, like he was trying to draw out something that was buried deep in Aomine’s chest, and Aomine—Aomine wanted so, so badly for him to succeed.

“Tetsu,” he said to the dark one night. Kuroko was curled into his chest in a tight, protective ball, and Aomine carded his hand through his hair. “Hey, Tetsu.”

Kuroko stirred, pulling back a little to look up at him. He blinked sleepily. “Aomine-kun?” he asked, his mouth moving softly over his name, and Aomine couldn’t breathe right, couldn’t get his heart unstuck from his throat. “Thank you,” he managed, and pushed the edges of his mouth up through sheer will. “For trying.”

Kuroko stared up at him, a moon-pale boy close in his arms. His. His. “It’s not enough,” he said. It wasn’t a question, which—wonderfully—meant Aomine didn’t have to answer it.

He nudged Kuroko’s face with his, kissed him softly, and knew he had anyway.

+

It got worse.

It got worse, and he got worse (but he didn’t, he just kept getting _better_ , better and better and more and more monstrous) and he was standing on a riverbed in the rain, furious and hurting—pained, his chest aflame with it— and _hurting_ —lashing out, Kuroko’s eyes wide with shock—and it got so, so much worse.

+

Kuroko wasn’t at practice the next day. Kuroko wasn’t at school at all; Kuroko was gone and Aomine was an anchor cut suddenly free from his ship.

Momoi tried to help him surface. Her first method was taking him out for coffee and yelling at him; he snapped right back without ever once feeling the heat of his own anger. Her second method was ignoring him, which at any other point in his life would have worked, but now—now it felt right that he should be alone. He was alone, alone at the top—no one could beat him but him.

Her third method was pressing him back against the wall, her teeth at his throat; was slipping knowing, teasing fingers down his ribs to his fly. He leaned his head back against the wall but the curl of pleasure in his stomach brought with it a wave of sorrow, of _loss_ , so intense that he fought her off and stumbled to the doorway, catching himself with a hand and struggling to breathe.

Somewhere along the line, sex had gone from something he associated with her to something he associated with Kuroko. And now. _Fuck_.

“Okay,” she said shakily from behind him. “Okay.”

He turned, halfway, to look at her. “Sorry,” he said. “Satsuki—I’m sorry.”

She raised her eyebrows at him. “Are you?” she asked, and then gave him a tiny smile. “Then that’s something, at least.”

He crossed to her, kissed her without letting himself think, and let himself out.

+

Kuroko’s new team beat Kise, and Aomine let that knowledge roll off his shoulders. Kuroko’s new team beat Midorima, and he called Momoi—told her, and through her Aomine, about a new ace, someone able to handle Kuroko’s passes and use them to surpass the Miracles. 

Kagami Taiga. A new light to Kuroko’s shadow. That, Aomine couldn’t let go.

He worked it over in his mind. Maybe Kuroko was so angry with him he’d—he’d latched on to someone, maybe this was revenge, or just. Showing Aomine he was replaceable.

Or maybe—and this was a thought that lit a secret fire in his heart—Kuroko was doing this for him. Maybe he’d left because he knew Aomine just needed someone to beat him, maybe calling this Kagami his light was his way of saying, _look, here, I found him_. Of saying, _I can still help you._ Of saying, _I still know what you need like no one else does._

The third possibility—that this Kagami shone as he did, that their connection was genuine, that Kuroko had simply found someone else—was one that made Aomine feel sick and angry and dulled, like he’d been throwing himself against the walls of some cage until he lost his edge.

They’d meet on the court soon, but Aomine couldn’t wait that long, needed to test this new light himself, needed to see how he measured up.

He pulled himself up off the floor.

“Where are you going, Aomine-kun?” Momoi asked. It didn’t even hurt, anymore, that she’d stopped calling him _Dai-chan_. Most things didn’t really hurt, anymore.

“Seirin,” he said, pulling on his shoes. “I’m going to meet Kagami Taiga.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am SO SORRY this took so goddamn long to write, and that this section is so short. I actually wrote this fic pretty much backward, so most of what will be the third chapter is finished, and is REALLY GOOD, I promise. This first section feels a little rough to me, pacing-wise, but I've been staring at it so long that I couldn't handle it anymore.
> 
> Aomine's a difficult one, I'll tell you that.
> 
> Timeline-wise, this chapter contains a scene from [ A Brother In Arms](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3306077) and brings us almost up to the beginning of [A Liar or a Lover](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3215942), so a lot of the next chapter will be familiar scenes. There will be a lot that's unfamiliar, too, however!
> 
> You may also note that despite what I said about this being the last fic in this series, it says "penultimate" in the summary. That's because I've decided I want the series as a whole to mirror itself, with Midorima and Takao as the glass, so to speak. So you have Seirin Triangle-->AoKagaKuro-->KiseKasa-->Midotaka-->KiseKasa-->AoKagaKuro-->Seirin Triangle. The parallel has happened mostly by accident and is too good not to complete, so there will be a (probably quite short) HyuuKiyoRiko fic coming up after this one is done, bringing us full circle and to the end of the 'verse.
> 
> Anyway! That was a lot of notes! I love you, please enjoy, and as always - let me know your thoughts.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Aomine says some pretty shitty stuff about aromantic people in this chapter. His views in no way reflect mine, and I tried to make it clear that he's being an asshole/wrong in the narrative, but wanted to include a note in case that's something that might trigger some folks. Read with caution!

Momoi tagged along on the train ride—mostly to try and talk him out of it. Kagami Taiga wasn’t up for this, she insisted. Kagami Taiga had been injured, he probably wouldn’t even be at practice.

So Aomine didn’t go to practice. He jogged slow circles around the school instead, not really sure what he was looking for but knowing he would know when he found it. It felt—good, to be outside in the summer air, better to have a reason to be. A purpose.

He found Kagami on a streetball court a few blocks from Seirin. He heard him, first—the almost too-familiar rhythmic thud of someone dribbling a basketball, the scuff and shift of shoes on pavement. He stuck to the shadow of a nearby building and watched.

The boy on the court was tall—taller than Aomine, probably, although not as tall as Murasakibara or Midorima—and long-limbed, broad-shouldered, open-faced. He moved with a kind of rough, easy grace, comfortable in his own skin and on the court both, his movements practiced and casual. He could have been anyone—any Seirin player, or even someone from a different school using their court, anyone who loved the sport enough to play like it was as natural as breathing. Except.

The sun was bright in the early summer sky, but somehow there was a—a sheen to Kagami anyway. Aomine found himself unable to quite shake off his presence—unable to quite size him up. It was like looking at—at a banked fire, at coals that could spring to life at any moment, red and waiting and _warm_.

He was Kuroko’s new light, Aomine had no doubt of that—but he wasn’t enough. 

For one thing, Momoi was right—Momoi was always right. He watched Kagami take a stance as if to jump, watched his muscles twitch and twinge. He grunted, a small sound as frustrated as it was pained, and the basketball dropped from his fingers, bouncing across the court and rolling right to Aomine’s feet.

He picked it up. “Hey,” he said, and Kagami turned. “You're Kagami Taiga, right? Play me. I'll test you."

Kagami stared at him. “What? Who the hell are you?” He rolled his shoulders, looking annoyed. “I don't take kindly to guys who tell me to play them without even telling me their names."

“I don't care how you feel,” Aomine drawled, raising an eyebrow at him. “If I tell you to play, you play.”

Kagami bristled, and Aomine smirked at him. Easy to rile up. He licked his lips. How much did this idiot know? How much had Kuroko told him? What were they, to each other?

“I'll tell you my name, at least,” he said, testing. “It's Aomine Daiki."

Kagami’s eyes widened. “Aomine?” he said, more softly, surprised. His lips pulled back from his teeth, a motion towards a snarl. The trees around the court shuddered in the wind. “I've heard about you,” Kagami said, and Aomine couldn’t fucking read that at all, he could mean anything, he could just mean as a player, or, “but you can't expect me to just say yes when you talk down to me like—"

Aomine laughed at him, feeling sharp and sad and suddenly tired of this farce. “I said I'm not asking,” he said harshly. “Shut up and play.” His lip curled in twin answer to Kagami’s disdain. “No one's expecting a _real_ match. I told you, I'm testing you."

Kagami narrowed his eyes, shifting his weight on his feet.

“I'm not looking for something that doesn't exist, like a stronger player than I am,” Aomine continued, raising the basketball. Goading. Lying through his fucking teeth. “I just want to know how much you can do to relieve my _boredom_."

Kagami took a long breath, like he was steadying himself, and Aomine waited.

Finally Kagami raised his eyes. “From Kise to Midorima,” he said, “the Generation of Miracles is full of guys who piss me off. But you're exceptional even among them."

Aomine almost started laughing again, almost snapped _you have no fucking idea_ , but Kagami was moving, stepping up into defensive position, and Aomine let himself go.

It was almost too easy. 

He stopped trying, after a few minutes, just faded back from the panting, wincing form of his opponent, dribbling the ball lazily. "This is ridiculous,” he drawled, his tongue thick with disappointment. “Did you really beat Midorima?"

Kagami glared at him. He had kind of amazing eyes—sharp and red-brown under strange, split brows. “Bastard,” he snapped.

Aomine smirked at him, lining up his words like darts. There was no way this guy would ever match up. Better to destroy him and move on. He could stop hoping, then; he could go back to sleep. "Tetsu's judgment must be clouded,” he said, watching Kagami’s face like a cat. He saw those eyes widen, surprised and hurt—not offended, but _hurt_ , and that pushed up against Aomine’s chest, pressing, demanding interpretation, demanding he—imagine.

Aomine had pretty much stopped imagining much of anything. He sank deeper into his own skin, licked his lips, continued: “You can't draw out his full potential. He's a shadow. The stronger the light, the darker the shadow.” He changed his dribble speed, just a little, so the basketball hit the pavement harder, louder, faster. “In other words, he becomes stronger or weaker depending on the strength of the light." 

He flicked his eyes left and then drove immediately right, slipping past Kagami’s defense like he wasn’t even there. Too easy. "Your light,” he said, passing close enough to Kagami to speak in his ear even as he moved toward him to the net, “is too _dim_."

He hooked the ball through the hoop like an afterthought, and walked away.

Momoi caught him up at the train station, giving him a nod. “So?”

He fought the urge to spit. “Useless,” he said. “Can’t believe he beat Kise, let alone Midorima.”

Momoi’s face fell, and he was—sweating, at least, and outside, and so he added, “Kinda hot, though,” just to make her smile.

It worked. She grinned, small and amused, and shook her hair out of her face. “Who knows,” she said quietly, “they might surprise you.”

Aomine took a breath. “They,” he said softly. 

She stepped a little closer to his side.

+

They.

He knew it would be harder, in a real game. He knew Kagami would be fired up, and that playing against Kuroko would go against every instinct he had. And he was right—he narrowly avoided passing to him a few times, his presence-non-presence on the court familiar and intoxicating. But he hadn’t expected the way that they _moved_ , the two of them, the way they worked together, the way the whole game stretched like a web between them, changing shape as they willed it. The way the whole team was only points on that web, coordinated and tuned to each other like Teiko had never been.

He hadn’t expected their determination to forge together into something so, so much greater than Kagami could be alone. Hadn’t expected Kagami to run a fond hand up Kuroko’s back to his head, hadn’t expected Kuroko to smile up at him, private and knowing. 

Hadn’t expected being utterly unable to _breathe_.

He switched off his brain and burned cold and furious through their web.

He considered walking out, afterward, just—walking, and walking, and walking, until his legs finally got tired and he had to stop. It sounded nice, reaching that limit. Reaching any limit. 

But. But he was closer to Kuroko than he had been in a year, and he couldn’t just—go.

Kuroko was alone in the locker room and Aomine tried, hard, not to make anything of that. Kuroko stripped off his shirt—not like Kise, not showing off for him, just—changing, as if he were alone. 

Aomine slammed a hand into the locker above him, leaned in too close, and waited for Kuroko to stop ignoring him.

He didn’t.

“If you’re trying to make me jealous,” Aomine said at last, voice low, “it won’t work.” It wasn’t what he’d meant to start with but he couldn’t really make himself care. Couldn’t do anything but look at him, try and. Try and drink him in.

Kuroko didn’t look up. “Why would I be trying to make you jealous?” he asked, detached, deadpan, and Aomine made a frustrated, helpless kind of noise.

“Your new _light_ ,” he said darkly, “is totally graceless, useless, and an idiot. All he can do is jump. He barely manages to catch your passes!” It wasn’t true; Kagami had done better against him than anyone within recent memory and his coordination with Kuroko was _unreal_ for the amount of time they’d spent together but. But he needed to know why Kuroko had done this, which of his theories were correct, because he couldn’t possibly think they had had a chance of winning, which left—either, either he was doing this because he was angry, or. 

Or the looks he’d given Kagami on the court were real.

“I thought it _wasn’t_ working, Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said coolly, turning to look at him, and their gazes caught, and—dragged, like fingernails on skin.

Aomine swallowed hard. 

He watched Kuroko take a breath—watched the way it shifted the muscles of his chest—watched his eyes flicker over his face, his shoulders, his throat, and maybe there should have been victory in that but it just made Aomine ache. “Tetsu,” he said, raising a hand to—to touch his jaw, to. He stopped.

Kuroko just watched him, waiting, eyes huge and blue.

“Nevermind,” Aomine said, finally, because—he didn’t have the courage for this, definitely didn’t have the words. “I just—“ he ran a hand through his hair. “I won.”

Kuroko raised his eyebrows at him—the look he got when Aomine had said the exact wrong thing. “And you think that changes something.”

“Doesn’t it?” Aomine asked, a little desperate, a little pissed, because. _Didn’t_ it?

Kuroko turned away, knocking Aomine’s arm away from his locker with a hard flick of his wrist. “No,” he said shortly, and retrieved his bag. Slinging it over his shoulder, he started to leave.

Aomine took three strides, preventing him from going anywhere, because no, that wasn’t. They weren’t done. “Why not?” he asked. “It’s proof, right? That I’m better than him.”

Kuroko opened his mouth, and then closed it again. “That’s not important,” he said, finally.

Aomine stared at him. “Of course it is.”

Kuroko closed his eyes, and Aomine had to fight not to touch him, to get him to open them again, he’d, he’d spent too long with Kuroko not looking at him.

“I meant for me,” Kuroko said carefully. “I meant for—how I feel.”

Aomine froze. There was a nervous thread to his voice that he knew. It’d been there that day in the dark— _I still wanted to see you_ —and it had been there that day after practice— _I’m very happy_ —and it was here, now, only. Now it wasn’t about him.

Kuroko opened his eyes, and Aomine forced his face into his blandest mask. He shifted backward, throat tight, and shoved his hands in his pockets so Kuroko wouldn’t see them shaking. “Yeah,” he said, to say anything. “Alright. Whatever, then.” He turned to leave, his jaw clenched tight against the beat of his heart. “I’ll see you around, Tetsu.”

He’d almost made it to the doorway when Kuroko said, “Aomine-kun.”

He turned, just enough to see him, hope blooming in his chest.

“If you will stop treating me like a prize to be won, I would like to see you sometime,” Kuroko said, and—it was still there, the nervousness, true and baffling. “I miss you.”

Aomine took a breath, something loosening in his chest, and felt himself smile, just a little. “Yeah,” he said, softer than he meant, and then coughed, embarrassed. “Just, y’know. Text me, we’ll get dinner.” He lifted a hand to wave, and then paused. He wanted to—apologize, or say—anything, say _thank you_ , say _I miss you too,_ but it all stuck in his throat and he’d. He’d have _time_ , now, even if Kuroko didn’t want to hear it.

He finished the wave instead.

He rejoined the rest of his team as they got on the bus. Momoi blinked at him as he slid into the seat next to her at the front. “You’re,” she started, and then stopped. “I was going to say you were smiling but you also kind of look like someone just ran over your dog. What’s up?”

Aomine leaned back, tilting his head upward to stare at the ceiling of the bus. “Well,” he said. “I saw Tetsu.”

Momoi nodded, unsurprised. “And,” she prompted.

Aomine closed his eyes. Easier not to think, like this. “I think he’s falling in love with Kagami,” he said, quietly; he heard her little intake of breath. She didn’t deny it, though, and that made Aomine’s stomach lurch sickeningly. She’d seen them out there the same as he had, and she knew. She always knew.

“A-and the smile?” she asked, when it was clear he wasn’t going to say more.

He felt his lips curl, felt his eyelashes go suddenly and miserably wet. “He said he misses me,” he whispered. “I—Satsuki, _fuck_.”

She slid a hand over his shoulders and into his hair, pulling his head down against her neck. “Fuck,” she echoed, and for the first time in a year Aomine let himself cry.

+

Kuroko texted him a few days later, a casual _you mentioned dinner, aomine-kun?_ slotting into place on his phone screen like an answer to Aomine’s desperate _tetsu, please_ , eight months too late. 

They end up going to a café at the mall, not too far from Aomine’s place. He didn’t dress up—it wasn’t a date, not wearing date clothes would maybe finally convince him of that. Kuroko looked—casual and clean and happy and _older_ , and Aomine couldn’t stop looking at the ways his face had changed, in just a year—he was thinner and more muscled both, his cheekbones more pronounced. The set of his jaw was just as stubborn and wonderful as ever and Aomine had never felt like this, never been so happy and so sad to see anyone in his life.

“Hey,” he said, and gestured Kuroko to his seat.

Kuroko sat, looking at him with his head on one side. “How are you, Aomine-kun?”

Aomine hid his expression in pulling out his chair. “Y’know,” he said, waving a hand as he sat down. “Same old, same old.”

Kuroko’s eyes got a little sadder, and Aomine coughed. “You?”

Kuroko hummed a little. “I like Seirin,” he said. “I’ve made a lot of friends.”

Jealousy and pride had a fistfight in Aomine’s chest. “Good,” he said shortly, and tried to smile naturally.

Kuroko smiled back, and it—got a little easer. They ordered food, and as they ate Kuroko gave him a breakdown of Seirin’s game against Midorima, his summary not lingering overly long on Kagami but it felt deliberate, and that almost made it worse—Aomine wanted to interrupt, snap _just fucking talk about him if you want to_. Every omission of his name made him loom larger between them.

“I think Midorima-kun has a boyfriend,” Kuroko said, and took a sip of his water.

Aomine stared at him. “You’re kidding. Midorima’s gay?”

Kuroko shrugged. “At the very least Takao-kun is very into him.” He smiled a little. “And it did seem pretty mutual.”

Aomine shook his head. “Can you imagine dating that guy?” He straightened up, pushing the tip of his finger up his nose to adjust imaginary glasses. “I’m sorry,” he said stiffly, “but we can’t have sex today, oho-asa says.”

Kuroko grinned at him, his eyes crinkling up warm, and adopted his own version of Midorima’s strange, stilted speech. “I hope you do not mind too much if I bring this giant stuffed penguin with us on our date,” he said. “It’s my lucky item, see. Do you think we could get it its own seat on the Ferris wheel?”

Aomine laughed, a little, and Kuroko smirked sideways at him, proud of himself, and it was almost like no time has passed at all, almost like nothing ever. Happened. A year, collapsed; folded up small on the table between them.

He saw Kuroko feel the same way, saw him school his face to something less fond, less knowing, and he went a little cold.

He had no news to share; his life _was_ the same-old, same-old, what would he even say— _still haven’t lost to anyone, still feel empty as hell, still haven’t found anyone I want like I want you_ —and he really didn’t want to ask about Kagami, but maybe he should just fucking get it over with, maybe. Maybe he had to, in order to feel anything but terrible and displaced and jealous for longer than thirty seconds. 

“So,” he said, “have you fucked him yet?”

Kuroko regarded him steadily. “Aomine-kun,” he said, all warmth gone from his eyes, “do you want me to leave?”

Aomine tried to hold his gaze, but it slid right past the bitter walls around his heart and he—couldn’t, knew in another second Kuroko would stop being pissed and start being pitying. He broke eye contact. Fuck that. _Fuck_ that.

Kuroko sighed. “If we’re going to be seeing more of each other you’re going to have to stop doing this,” he said, and Aomine took a long, shaky breath. “I want to hang out with you so I am hanging out with you,” Kuroko continued, “not so you can accuse me of being a slut or insult my new light.”

Aomine clenched his jaw, hard. He wanted to say, _he doesn’t fucking deserve you,_ wanted to say, _I didn’t mean it like that_ , wanted to say, _why the hell would you want a new light when I still need you so bad_ but he picked up his water instead, taking a long drink.

“Besides,” Kuroko said, and Aomine looked at him again, at his soft, unsure expression. “I don’t actually know how Kagami-kun feels about me.”

Aomine slowly lowered his drink from his mouth. “You’re kidding,” he said flatly, because he fucking had to be, after the way Kagami interacted with him on the court. “Have you _seen_ the way he looks at you?”

Kuroko blinked at him.

“God,” said Aomine, “I thought you knew and were playing off it to make me jealous, but you really haven’t noticed?” He leaned back in his chair, grimacing. “He fuckin’ lights up every time you even glance his way, and the rare times he manages to do something useful when you get him the ball he’s so happy it’s disgusting.” _As happy as I used to be_. He shook his head, disgusted with Kagami, with Kuroko for being so stupid, with himself. “Tetsu. I saw the two of you interact for a total of an hour and I knew.”

Kuroko shook his head, slowly. He stared at the table for a minute, and then licked his lips. Aomine tried not to stare.

“Why tell me?” Kuroko asked.

Aomine sat forward again. “What do you mean?”

Kuroko smiled gently at him, his blue eyes warming again. “It doesn’t exactly benefit you, Aomine-kun.”

Aomine opened his mouth to snap that he didn’t just do things that benefited himself, thank you very much, but stopped himself. He’d. He’d told him because it was true, and because Kuroko clearly needed to hear it, and.

Kuroko leaned forward, widened his eyes pleadingly, and waited. He looked so much like Momoi when she was giving him puppy-dog eyes that it made Aomine smile, just a little. “Stop that,” he drawled. “It doesn’t work for Satsuki either, and she’s got much better tits than you.”

Kuroko deepened his pout. ”Please?"

Aomine shoved a hand into his hair, looking away from him, from the beautiful curl of his mouth. “Fine,” he said shortly. “I just—you.” He swallowed, his heart pushing upward in his chest. “You deserve to know that you’re loved.”

Kuroko went wide-eyed. “Aomine,” he said, his voice soft, and somehow the lack of the suffix made Aomine’s heart race, made the blood rush to his face.

“Shut up, god,” he said quickly, “this is why I didn’t want to say anything—“

He stopped talking because Kuroko was moving, leaning lightning-quick across the table and hooking a hand around the back of Aomine’s neck and kissing him.

 _Kissing him_. Aomine kissed back immediately, hard. His mouth remembered Kuroko’s mouth, his fingers grazing over Kuroko’s jaw his tongue slipping between Kuroko’s lips before he could think about whether it was a good idea or not. Kuroko was warm and eager and it wasn’t fucking _fair_ , what—he pulled back, because the other option was to keep kissing him forever, and if this was—if this was goodbye he needed to. Know.

He imagined goodbye kisses were a little bit less—teasing than this, though; he’d imagined goodbye kisses a lot, considering he never actually got to have one, couldn’t even remember what the last kiss he had with Kuroko was like, whether it had been casual and quick or post-coital or frustrated or, or nothing at all, absent, unthinking. Criminal, that he’d ever kissed this boy with anything but his full fucking attention.

He couldn’t quite make himself let go of Kuroko’s face even after they’d separated, swiping his thumb over his lower lip—soft, so fucking soft against his skin—and forcing himself to look at his eyes.

“You haven’t changed at all,” he said, trying to understand the look on Kuroko’s face. “You still make no fucking sense.”

Kuroko pursed his lips, kissing the pad of his thumb, and Aomine’s heart flipped over in his chest. “What do you mean?” he asked.

Aomine narrowed his eyes. “I just told you for sure Kagami likes you, and instead of running off to confess your undying love or whatever, you kiss me.”

Kuroko raised his eyebrows. “I kissed you because I wanted to,” he said. “Why should my feelings for Kagami-kun have anything to do with my feelings for you?”

Aomine wondered what Momoi would think of his face now, after a one-two punch like that. _Feelings for Kagami_ was like a fucking knife in the back, but _feelings for you_ rang sharp and clear and heady in his brain and he, he had no idea what to do.

He licked his lips, and Kuroko blinked slow at him. “But,” Aomine said at last, “what you said after the game—“

“I said it didn’t matter that you won,” Kuroko said, carefully, like Aomine was a stupid child, “and that you should stop treating me as a prize. This is part of why. It is not a competition.”

Aomine shook his head. None of this made any sense but his heart was beating strong in his chest and he couldn’t stop his gaze from wandering back down to Kuroko’s mouth. “I don’t get it,” he said, “but—does this mean I can—?”

Kuroko nodded, smiling a little, and Aomine leaned in to lick at that smile, to nip and suck at it, to memorize the way it felt against his mouth so he could always call it to mind, in case. In case. He drew Kuroko’s lower lip between his, flicking his tongue against it, and heard Kuroko’s breath stutter in through his nose. His fingers spasmed against his thigh in response. Fuck, fuck, he _wanted_ —

“Oh,” said someone, from very far away, and then “I’m so sorry, I was just coming to say hi, I’ll just—go—“

Kuroko pulled away and Aomine reluctantly let him, following his gaze to find Kise, of all people, bright red and hovering an awkward distance away. He met Aomine’s eyes for a split second and then his gaze slid away. “Kurokocchi, I-I didn’t realize you two were—you know what, I’m probably late for something!” 

He rushed away, nearly knocking someone over in his haste.

Aomine frowned after him. “What’s his problem?” Surely he couldn’t still be into Kuroko. He assumed he’d gotten over that shit ages ago.

Kuroko sighed. “I am not the only one who is bad at noticing certain things, Aomine-kun,” he said.

Aomine scowled at him. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

Kuroko shook his head, hesitated a little, and then stood up. “We should be somewhere less public, if we’re going to continue this conversation.”

Aomine was on his feet immediately, holding out a hand without thinking about it. He was about to take it back—unsure if it was appropriate—when Kuroko took it, threading their fingers together exactly as he always had.

Aomine stared straight ahead of him on the way to the train, afraid if he looked at Kuroko too much he might let go. Once they were seated, though, he couldn’t help but glance at him. This was—it was too easy, it made no sense—if this was all it took, why. Why hadn’t they spoken in nearly a year, why had he been so lost for so long? Was it all on his own shoulders? Could he have had this, if he’d just _tried_ a little harder?

Kuroko went ahead of him into his apartment and Aomine lingered in the doorway, not quite looking at him. After a minute Kuroko sank down on the couch, silent.

Aomine joined him there, facing him, searching Kuroko’s face for some—something, some clue to why this was _okay_ , why they were here, why Kuroko had kissed him at all and why he—hadn’t, for so long.

“Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said, prompting.

“Why’d you leave?” Aomine asked, the words kind of—jumbling up in his mouth, and it wasn’t even the right question because he, he kind of knew. He knew what he’d said. He knew how much the words had to hurt because he knew the force he’d put behind them as they’d left his mouth, cruel, too much, false.

Kuroko licked his lips, his eyes going a little cold. “Because you turned your back on me,” he said flatly.

Aomine stared at him. “I didn’t—“

“You did,” Kuroko said levelly. “You decided my style of basketball wasn’t something you needed, that _I_ wasn’t—“ his eyes went bright as he spoke, and he cut himself off, looking away. “All of you put yourselves above me, Aomine-kun,” he said, thickly, staring at the wall. “But you were the one who left me behind.” He curled into himself, pulling his knees up to his chest.

“Tetsu,” Aomine breathed, horrified, because—he’d expected _because you were an asshole_ , he’d expected _because you crossed a line_ , but he hadn’t expected Kuroko to think—to think he’d somehow set himself against him, abandoned him, as if. As if he _could_. As he he’d ever stop needing him, needing this. 

He, god, he didn’t. He was so fucking bad at words. He leaned forward, instead; draped himself slow and warm across Kuroko’s back, braced for Kuroko to shove him off. He didn’t, and Aomine hooked his chin over his shoulder, barely able to breathe.

“Stupid,” he said against Kuroko’s ear, and Kuroko turned his face away. 

“Stupid, _stupid_ ,” Aomine repeated, insistent, because he needed Kuroko to understand what he meant. Tentatively, he traced his hands up Kuroko’s chest, trying to draw patterns of sincerity against his skin. “Of course I needed you,” he said, and bit the joint of Kuroko’s shoulder and neck gently. “I still need you, I’ll _always_ need you.”

Kuroko let his head drop back against Aomine’s shoulder, and Aomine felt his eyes go wet for the second time this week, his throat going hot and tight. “I was an asshole,” he admitted, because Kuroko hadn’t said that part and it was necessary, dammit. Kuroko laughed at that, a little shakily, raised a hand to bury his fingers in Aomine’s hair as Aomine kissed his way up his throat. “I’m so sorry,” he breathed, feeling—sad and guilty and incredible, high on the sweet softness of Kuroko’s skin against his mouth.

Kuroko squirmed against him. “That’s probably the sexiest thing you’ve ever said to me,” he deadpanned, meeting Aomine’s eyes with his own, bright with tears but with forgiveness, too.

Aomine laughed and buried his face in Kuroko’s shoulder, subtly wiping his own eyes on his shirt.

Kuroko ran his nails over Aomine’s scalp, and Aomine mouthed his way up Kuroko’s neck again to nip at his earlobe, his hands wandering down to slip under Kuroko’s shirt.

Kuroko curled his head around to kiss him, twitching a little when Aomine ran his calloused hands up his ribs to thumb over his nipples. Aomine licked into his mouth and Kuroko made a frustrated noise, pulling back. He knocked Aomine’s hands away so he could turn in his arms, nearly slid off the couch, and caught himself with a flailing hand.

Aomine laughed at him, and Kuroko made a face, standing up so he could move Aomine limbs into a more convenient arrangement, and Aomine had never been so happy to surrender his body to anyone. Kuroko slipped up between Aomine’s knees and Aomine couldn’t stand it, looping a hand around the back of his neck and drawing him insistently forward to seal their mouths together again. 

He needed— _needed_ to be kissing him, needed to be touching him in any way he could, needed. Fuck, god, he was—he was dying, probably, it had been nearly a year since anyone other than himself had touched him and he didn’t even do that much anymore because eventually magazines bored him enough that the images in his head took over and until this fucking moment, this moment here where Kuroko traced little teasing patterns over his abs, where Kuroko kissed him exactly like he used to with lips just a little bit different, until this fucking _second_ those images had brought Aomine much more pain than they had arousal, and he’d shoved them far far back in his head. Now, though. Now they all came back at once, a lightning strike from his head—his heart—to his dick, and it was. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Missed you,” he said against Kuroko’s mouth, and Kuroko made a really, truly unfair little broken little noise and maybe he could sense Aomine’s desperation because he sped things up. Kuroko pulled off his shirt and tugged at Aomine’s; Aomine pushed him back a little to pull it off and Kuroko sat up, his eyes shifting hot over Aomine’s skin.

Aomine raised his eyebrows at him. “Tets—“

Kuroko cut him off with his mouth, pressing forward so they were chest to chest, skin to skin, and Aomine’s skimmed his hands over his shoulders, his whole body shaking a little with relief and need and terror, because—what if he did something stupid, what if he fucked this up, what if they got this far and—or, or what if this was the only time this happened, what if this was a goodbye because Kuroko was going to confess to Kagami and—

Kuroko bit him, nipping at his lips and then lower, teeth against his jaw, and Aomine tried to stop thinking, because if this _was_ the only time this happened he was going to fucking enjoy himself.

He settled one hand in the perfect, graceful hollow of Kuroko’s back, the other sliding down to palm over his ass, and Kuroko shifted his hips so he was grinding down against Aomine’s hardening cock and back up against his hand in slow, deliberate circles.

“God,” said Aomine, tightening his grip, and Kuroko leaned down to press his grin against Aomine’s throat and fuck, _fuck_ , he loved that stupid smug fucking smile, loved how goddamn proud Kuroko was of himself.

With good reason. Kuroko bit at Aomine’s collarbone and Aomine cursed and arched up against him. Kuroko gasped, a little, and worked one of his small, strong hands down in between them. Aomine gave his ass a last squeeze and slid his hands around to try and help, fumbling with the zipper of Kuroko’s jeans, and this used to be so much easier, when they only ever did this after practice, when they were only ever in basketball shorts and not real clothing. Kuroko finally got his jeans shoved down enough and thank god Aomine hadn’t worn date clothing because Kuroko had his shorts shoved down his thighs in about ten seconds, his grip on Aomine’s cock sudden and sure and Aomine kissed him slow and filthy to make sure he knew how fucking _good_ he was.

He returned the favor, savoring the weight of Kuroko’s cock against his palm, the perfect, half-familiar way he shuddered and jerked against him. He wanted, he wanted to be slow and teasing, wanted to make this last as long as he could, wanted to feel this slick weight against him forever, wanted Kuroko’s breath against his mouth and Kuroko’s hand around his dick for the rest of his goddamn life because he hadn’t, he couldn’t, he—

Kuroko broke their kiss to take a shuddering breath against his jaw, and Aomine wanted to see his face but didn’t want to open his eyes, didn’t want to see him as he was now because what if as he was now included _not his_ and, and, it was easier to push this back a year, easier to imagine that it was them as they had been, not as they were or would be, because he had no fucking clue what they would be, ever again.

Kuroko ran a gentle thumb over his cheekbone, trying to get him to open his eyes, and Aomine twitched, tightening his grip on Kuroko’s cock but refusing, refusing.

Kuroko’s mouth was at his ear, all hot breath. Kuroko’s tongue slipped back behind his earlobe, drew it slow and teasingly between his lips, Kuroko’s teeth were nipping and tugging at him, insistent, and when he breathed, “look at me,” Aomine had no strength left to resist.

When he opened his eyes Kuroko was sitting up, pushing his hair out of his face with one hand, his lips parted loose and red as he rocked into Aomine’s grip. He looked—god, god, he looked _happy_ , his mouth curling into a smile as Aomine stared, his heart lifting straight up against the ribs of his chest and staying there, smashing upward, fighting to get to this boy, this boy, this boy. 

He made a noise—wordless, pleading—and saw Kuroko see him too well, saw the brilliant, wondering parts of his brain come to life, and he couldn’t—that wasn’t fair, he shouldn’t be able to think, not with Aomine’s very clever hand all over his dick, thank you very much.

He used the hand he had in Kuroko’s hair to tug him down, growling, “stop fucking thinking,” against his mouth and knocking Kuroko’s hand away from his dick. The angle was different, now—they were sliding together, slick with sweat and pre-come, and Aomine wrapped his hand around both of them. Kuroko shook, shook against him, making tiny little noises that were swallowed up by Aomine’s mouth on his.

They rocked together, sloppy, frantic, kissed with the same not-rhythm as their hips. When Aomine came it was white-hot and blinding, his shout muffled by Kuroko’s mouth, his fist tight in Kuroko’s hair, and when he’d shaken himself free of it Kuroko was right on his heels, thrusting into his own palm and the hollow of Aomine’s hip both.

He buried his face in Aomine’s neck when he came, and Aomine trailed his clean hand down the line of his spine, savoring the way he trembled, and waited for him to lift his head, feeling lazy and incredible.

Kuroko squirmed a little against him, a tiny smile playing at the corners of his mouth, and Aomine couldn’t help but take a breath out of. Out of pure fucking _wonder_.

“What is it?” Kuroko asked.

Aomine shook his head and lifted his chin to kiss him. “Didn’t think I’d ever get this again,” he muttered against Kuroko’s mouth.

Kuroko didn’t respond, just worked Aomine’s lower lip between his, and Aomine supposed he deserved that.

He wanted to ask Kuroko to stay—never wanted to take his eyes off him at all, really—but it was late and he didn’t know how and it was clear that Kuroko called the shots, here, and that, too, he deserved—deserved the uncertainty, deserved the way he ached after Kuroko kissed him in his doorway and disappeared down the hall.

No promises were made, but they’d never been much for promises, anyway.

+

“You got laid,” Momoi accused him as soon as they were out of homeroom, Monday morning.

Aomine scowled at her, but there was no heat to it. “What,” he said dryly, “has the muscle density in my dick changed by 0.002% or something?”

Momoi arched a brow at him. “I wouldn’t know,” she said, “haven’t seen it in a while.”

They were in the hall, a lazy duo in a stream of rushing people, and Aomine swooped across the space between them to bite the corner of her jaw—to anyone else, it probably looked like a kiss on the cheek, and everyone was half-convinced they were dating anyway. “Maybe that’ll change,” he said quietly, and straightened up.

She raised both eyebrows, now, her lips curling upward. “Oh yeah? So your date went well, then?”

“Wasn’t a date,” Aomine said automatically, and then frowned. “I think.”

Momoi shook her head. “You got dinner and then you had sex,” she said. “Sounds like a date to me.”

Aomine shrugged. “Yeah,” he said, “but.”

They reached Momoi’s locker, and she opened it to get the rest of her stuff. “Kagami.”

Aomine leaned against the lockers at her side and stared at the ceiling. “Kagami,” he confirmed. “I—Tetsu’s definitely. And I’m not really sure what that makes us, you know?” He took a breath. “He said he still has feelings for me.”

Momoi closed her locker and started down the hall. “So he still has feelings for you. Seems pretty clear to me.”

Aomine frowned after her. “I don’t know why the hell I thought you’d be any help with this.”

“Wow,” she said archly as he caught up. “I guess I’ll just walk here quietly while you angst for no reason, then, shall I?”

“It’s not for no reason,” Aomine said defensively. “What if he just wanted to have sex once and then run off to Kagami—“

Momoi rolled her eyes and stopped. “Look,” she said, turning to face him. “You know Tetsu-kun better than that. If you don’t know what’s going on, that’s because he doesn’t know, yet, what’s going on. If this is confusing for you, think about how he feels, with you popping back into his life just as he’s working out how he feels about Kagami.”

Aomine ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah,” he admitted.

Momoi put a hand on his arm. “He won’t lie to you,” she said. “Once he knows what he wants, so will you, and if it turns out you need to angst after that, I’m all ears, you know that. But until then, please let yourself be a little happy?” She cocked her head, her eyes warming. “Okay, Dai-chan?”

“Fine,” he said, grudging, to cover up his smile.

She looped their arms together and pulled him away to math class. “And if it turns out I’m right and you have nothing to worry about,” she said, her voice gone low and wicked, “you owe me a _lot_ of orgasms for putting up with your shit.”

+

“Kagami-kun isn’t interested in sex at all,” Kuroko said casually, lying curled into Aomine’s side, his face flushed, his eyes sleepy and post-orgasmic, his hair clinging pale and strange and beautiful to his forehead, and Aomine had never heard anything that made less sense in his life.

They’d kissed, Kuroko had told him; kissed and walked on the beach in the moonlight in a scene that made Aomine’s stomach turn with how disgustingly romantic it was, a kind of romance he’d never—really bothered with, and right now he was regretting that because. Because maybe if he walked on beaches Kuroko wouldn’t need to find someone else to walk on beaches with. Someone who doesn’t even want to fuck him, or be fucked by him, which as Aomine had just reaffirmed was objectively the best feeling in the world.

“Why _not?_ ” he asked, baffled.

Kuroko raised his eyebrows at him. “Why would he be?” he asked, challenging.

“Because it feels good?” Aomine said, scowling. “Did you really just fuck me and then turn around and ask me why people have sex?”

Kuroko rolled his eyes at him. “No,” he said. He licked his lips. “It doesn’t—change anything.”

“What, about the fact that you just fucked m—“ Kuroko reached out and twisted his nipple. “Ow, _shit!_ ”

Kuroko glared at him, and then suddenly he was pulling away, pushing himself to his feet and looking around for his clothes. “Nevermind,” he said, sounding resigned, and Aomine—hated that, hated having done that, just because he refused to fucking—face this. “We’ll talk about it later, I should go.”

Aomine sat up, reaching out to catch his elbow, and Kuroko turned to look at him.

“Hey,” Aomine said, meaning, _sorry_ , meaning, _give me another chance_.

Kuroko opened his hand. “Hey,” he said back, smiling a little.

Aomine transferred his grip from his elbow to his palm and brought Kuroko’s knuckles to his mouth, kissing them one after another, pulling him back into his space so they could. Talk.

“C’mon,” he said. “Sit down, if you wanna talk about it now we’ll talk about it now.”

Kuroko perched on the edge of the bed.

Aomine didn’t let go of his hand, taking a breath. “It doesn’t change anything,” he prompted. “For—how you feel about me?”

“For how I feel about Kagami,” Kuroko corrected. “Or you, obviously. I don’t—“ he swallowed. “I don’t want to lose what I’ve found with you again,” he said slowly, “but I—I won’t give up what I’m finding with him, either.”

Aomine—couldn’t look at his face, stared at their joined hands instead, watched Kuroko slowly shift his thumb over Aomine’s own. There was a semantic difference there that he couldn’t help but linger on—Aomine was _don’t want_ , with its implied _but would_ , and Kagami. Kagami was _won’t_. “Sure,” he said at last, not looking up. “Okay.”

Kuroko used his free hand to tilt up his chin until Aomine had to look at him. Kuroko’s eyes searched his face, and Aomine made himself smile. He just had to, to. Not do anything that made Kuroko think he had to choose. “It’s not like I didn’t see it coming,” he said, truthfully. He felt his smile shift bitter, tried to stop his lips from trembling. “I’m just glad he doesn’t want to fuck you,” he said, and it came out too sharp. “That would have _really_ made me jealous.”

“Oh,” said Kuroko, and he’d—seen, because there was a sad, strange note to his voice. “Aomi—“

Aomine leaned forward and fastened his lips to the joint of Kuroko’s shoulder and his neck, sucking hard enough to shut him up, to stop him _knowing_ so much. Kuroko gasped in surprise and pain, and Aomine let go of his hand to wrap his fingers around the base of his skull, keeping him still, giving him—anything he could, sensation, sensation that Kagami wouldn’t. And a bruise, to show the bastard. Even if Kuroko wasn’t his anymore in anything else, he was his in this.

“F-fuck,” Kuroko said, his hands coming up to cradle Aomine’s head, gentle, gentle, and Aomine released him, sliding a thumb down the perfect knife-sharpness of Kuroko’s hipbone.

Kuroko raised a hand to touch the slick mark Aomine’s mouth left behind, red and purpling already against his fingers, and Aomine should—probably not find that so hot. “What the hell,” he started, breathless.

Aomine shrugged jerkily and scrambled off the bed, because if they kept talking he wasn’t going to be able to stop himself from screaming or punching something. “You and the idiot are out to the team, right?” he asked. “Let them think he did it.” He leaned back in to press a hard kiss to Kuroko’s cheek, his mouth shifting along his cheekbone as he muttered. “Only we’ll know the truth.”

He went to take a shower. Kuroko didn’t follow, and when Aomine came out again he was gone. There was a note on his pillow, though; it just said, _thank you_.

Aomine stared at it for a long time, and then stared at himself in the mirror, at the bruises dotting his hipbones, at the shadows under his eyes. He felt—stuck halfway up, clinging to some rock, the clifftop within sight but not within reach. His arms were so tired.

 _satsuki_.

He sat back on his bed, phone cradled between his hands.

_dai-chan?_

He took a long breath. _how can I do what you do? love without being in love_

There was a long pause, and then his phone rang.

“You can’t,” Momoi said immediately, when he picked up, laying naked on his back in the sunlit silence of his own empty bedroom. “It’s not a choice, and you wouldn’t want to choose it anyway.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose, his eyes clenched shut. “Hurts,” he said. “Sounds simpler, your way.”

“It’s not,” she said quietly. “Trust me, it’s really not.”

“I just,” Aomine said. “I’m not sure I can do this.”

“Then leave him,” Momoi said, her voice soft, like she knew even the suggestion would hurt.

“No,” Aomine said immediately. “No, I need—I need it to be how it was before.”

“Nothing’s how it was before,” Momoi said. “Leave him, or be better at the thing you have now.”

“Maybe he just doesn’t remember,” Aomine said, desperate. “Maybe I could just—remind him.”

Momoi was silent for a long time. “Maybe,” she said at last, but her voice was full of doubt. “Maybe.”

+

They had another date—a real one, this time; Aomine was late, but Kuroko knew him, knew he would be, and was even later. Aomine lounged alone at a table at the mall, watching people drift by, alone and in pairs and groups. He found himself looking at the people in trios, wondering. Were any of them caught in this weird mess like he was? Did anyone else know what it was like to see the person they loved fall for someone else, all the while swearing blind that nothing had changed?

He caught sight of a familiar face, although it took him a minute to place it—light hair, big eyebrows, an open, puppyish smile. One of the Uncrowned Kings – their center, Kiyoshi Teppei. He played for Seirin, now, Aomine remembered, but he’d been out with an injury for the whole first half of the year.

Once he’d recognized him, it was easier to place the short girl at his side—Seirin’s coach, Riko—and the other boy, their clutch-shooter. Hyuuga. As he watched, Kiyoshi touched the small of Riko’s back to get her attention, pointing out a set of running gear in the window of a store. Riko leaned down to look at it, and Kiyoshi said something to Hyuuga, who turned a flustered shade of red.

Someone crossed in front of Aomine’s vision, breaking his gaze, and Aomine blinked and straightened. Kagami was stepping through the entrance of the food court. He looked good—deliberately good, put-together. Aomine scowled at him. Kagami caught sight of him and scowled right back, changing his course to make a beeline for his table.

“The fuck are _you_ doing here?” Kagami demanded.

Aomine glared at him. “Me? Why the hell are _you_ here, I’m meeting Tetsu—“

His phone vibrated in his pocket. He frowned and fished it out, frowned harder when Kagami did the same. He had a text from Kuroko. A group text with him and someone whose number he didn’t have.

_Aomine-kun, Kagami-kun, I’m so sorry! I got held up by Riko-san for extra practice. Please enjoy yourselves without me until I get there._

Aomine stared at it for a long moment. It couldn’t be more obviously a set-up, even if he hadn’t just seen Riko herself, conspicuously not practicing late. Did Kuroko really expect him to—what, just hang out with Kagami, without him? Because there was no way in hell that was happening. He tucked his phone back in his pocket and stood up. “You’ll have to enjoy yourself without me, too,” he said to Kagami. “I’m going home.”

He shoved his hands in his pockets and stepped past Kagami. He’d gone maybe a stride and a half when Kagami grabbed his arm.

He spun, immediately breaking free, and snapped, “what the _fuck_.”

Kagami’s face was annoyed but his eyes were calm. “Look,” he said flatly. “I don’t like this any more than you do. But it’s Kuroko’s plan.” He raised his eyebrows and crossed his arms over his chest. “Have you ever known his plans to fail?”

Aomine stared at him.

Kagami scrunched his mouth up in distaste. “Just—sit, would you?” he said, gesturing to Aomine’s seat.

Aomine sighed, running a hand over the back of his neck, and sat. Kagami did too, and the two of them stared angrily at the table.

“Just because his plans work doesn’t mean I want to hand him everything he wants on a silver platter,” Aomine muttered after a while.

“Don’t you?” Kagami countered, and there was a note in his voice that made Aomine raise his eyes to look at him. “Because I do. Anything and everything.”

Aomine clenched his fists so hard his knuckles popped. “Don’t,” he snapped. “Don’t you fucking dare even _imply_ that you’re somehow better than me, that you somehow care more. You have no idea what he means to me.” 

“You’re right,” said Kagami. “So tell me.”

Aomine was tempted to just tell him to fuck off, but there was a kind of challenging tilt to Kagami’s jaw and there was no fucking way he was going to back down from that. “He’s—“ he started. “I—I have never felt this way about anyone in my life,” he said, “and I’m dead fucking certain that I never will.”

Kagami watched him, silent. Aomine heard Momoi’s voice on the phone. _Leave him, or be better at what you have now._

“If,” said Aomine, his throat suddenly dry. “If this is how it has to be—if he doesn’t see reason and drop you like the worthless bastard you are—you need to fucking know that, and you need to not be a little bitch about it.” He smirked. “I know it must be hard not to want to assert your dominance in _some_ area, considering how shitty you are at basketball, but suck it the fuck up and make your peace with me, because I’m not going anywhere.”

Kagami’s jaw twitched. “I want you to know the only reason I haven’t kicked your ass is because Kuroko’s watching us right now, and I want to make a good impression.”

Aomine stared at him, startled, and it was Kagami’s turn to smirk. “You didn’t notice? He’s hiding under one of the fake bushes over by the restroom.”

Aomine hadn’t noticed. He blamed it on his anger; he blamed it on Kagami’s weird, overwhelming presence; he blamed it on anything he could so as not to put his fist through the nearest wall.

Maybe Kagami saw it in his face, because he relented a little. “C’mon, let’s, like. Eat something, at least.”

They ordered food, and Aomine channeled his annoyance into slowly stealing all of Kagami’s fries. He texted Kuroko back, a frustrated _you didn’t tell me HE was going to be here_ ; he carefully didn’t look over his shoulder to watch him receive it.

Kagami finished his fourth burger and sat back. “He can kind of be a smug little shit when he’s right,” he said pensively, out of left field, and Aomine was so startled by it that he actually laughed aloud. It was just—it was fucking _accurate_.

Kagami looked startled, like Aomine’s laugh was the last thing he’d expected, and then he smirked, pleased with himself, and for whatever reason this time it didn’t make Aomine want to smash his head against the table. He leaned in. “Let’s turn it around on him,” he said. “He got us into this mess, let him reap the rewards.”

Kagami nodded. “How, though?” he asked.

Aomine thought about that. The waitress came over, giving him an absent smile. “Are you ready for the check?”

Aomine shook his head. “Actually, we’re waiting on a friend,” he said. “When he gets here, he’ll pay—he owes us money.”

The waitress nodded. “I’ll check back soon.”

She left, and Kagami raised an eyebrow at him. “What are you planning?”

Aomine shrugged, and the Kagami’s eyes shifted over his shoulder. “He’s coming over here,” he said, the corner of his mouth curling up.

“Follow my lead,” Aomine muttered, and then Kuroko was standing by their table, smiling. “Hello,” he said. “Sorry for being so late.”

“Didn’t even notice you weren’t here,” Kagami said, smiling back.

“Because you were,” Aomine continued, rolling his eyes. “Come on, Tetsu, you really thought you could hide from us?”

Kuroko blinked. “I don’t know what you mean,” he said innocently.

Kagami reached up and plucked a fake leaf out of his hair. “You’re an idiot,” he said fondly. “Sit down.”

Kuroko sat, looking very pleased with himself. “So what were you guys talking about?”

“Well,” said Aomine, keeping his voice bored and hoping Kagami wasn’t too stupid to catch on, “we only really have the one thing in common, don’t we.”

Kuroko waited, his eyes curious.

Kagami nodded. “Basketball,” he supplied, on cue.

Kuroko glared at him. Aomine smirked to himself and stole another one of Kagami’s fries, and when Kagami raised a hand, palm-out, he thought _fuck it, why not_ and gave him the high five.

Kuroko put his head in his hands. “You’re both buying me dinner,” he warned through his fingers.

“Nope,” said Aomine.

“No way,” said Kagami.

Aomine stood; Kagami quirked his eyebrows questioningly at him but followed. “We told the waitress you’d take care of it,” he said to Kuroko. “That makes sense, right? Considering you’re the one taking us on a date?”

Kuroko stared at him. “But—“

“It makes sense to me,” Aomine said, tucking his hands in his pockets, and decided to step it up a notch. “Come on, Taiga-kun, you and me. Streetball?”

Kagami grinned at him, showing his teeth. “Sounds good, _Dai-chan_ ,” he said, voice sugar-sweet, and Aomine wanted to punch him, Momoi’s nickname weird and galling in his deep voice. He didn’t, though; he grit his teeth and held out an arm, instead.

Kagami took it, lips twitching with laughter or disgust or maybe both, and Kuroko stood up so fast he almost knocked over Kagami’s drink. “Oh my _god_ ,” he said, “Stop, please.”

They turned to look at him. He was flustered, his arms akimbo, his face caught halfway between annoyed and laughing, an expression Aomine had hardly ever seen on him. He and Kagami should team up more often, if they could get him to look so cute.

The thought made him feel weird, almost broke him out of his bit. “What’s wrong?” he asked, widening his eyes exaggeratedly.

Kuroko stared between them pleadingly. “If I never do this to you again will you never do this to me again?”

Aomine immediately dropped Kagami’s hand, letting his expression relax. “Done,” he said, and Kagami nodded with relief, his posture slouching. They shifted minutely away from one another.

After Kuroko had eaten and paid they did go outside and find a streetball court, for which Aomine was grateful—he was feeling displaced and weird, his prank with Kagami shifting the ever-present disgust and jealousy he felt whenever he saw the other ace into something—tempered, but no more comfortable. At least the guy could pick up cues.

Beating him at basketball helped. Kagami was playing with better control than he had in their game, but without Kuroko at his side was no real danger that Aomine might lose.

He carefully ignored how much the necessity of that qualifier got his blood up, and concentrated instead on the hilarious way Kagami’s whole face twitched when he was angry.

Aomine jogged after an out-of-bounds ball, breathing hard in the humid night air. He scooped it up and turned.

Kagami had left the court and was standing by Kuroko’s bench. As Aomine watched, Kuroko reached up and hooked a hand around the back of his neck, pulling him down to kiss him.

It was like—it was like someone had punched Aomine square in the throat. The gesture was so possessive, so _familiar_ that Aomine could feel Kuroko’s fingers against his own nape, his insistent mouth against his own lips. Kagami’s eyes were closed and his fingers casual on Kuroko’s jaw and Aomine wanted to break his hands in a thousand fucking places.

He took a breath, and then another. His own words in his head: _if this is how it has to be…_

He crossed to them, swallowed down everything he could, concentrating, first, on just—reminding them he was there. “Oi,” he said, as calmly as he could. “Don’t I get one of those?”

It—it would have been fine, maybe, if Kuroko had just kissed him, but he narrowed his eyes, instead, determined, maybe, to get his own back just a little from their teasing earlier. “He gets kissed because he stayed, and he made you stay,” he said matter-of-factly, “and you don’t because you were going to leave.”

Aomine rubbed the back of his neck, trying not to let either of them see how close he was to fucking breakdown. “I wasn’t gonna lea—“

Kuroko punched him in the stomach, gently but not _that_ gently. “Don’t lie to me so I’ll kiss you,” he said sharply.

Aomine blinked down at him. He was doing too good a job, or Kuroko was too lost in Kagami, or.

“Right,” he said, slipping a little, his voice coming out bitter. He glanced at Kagami, then back at Kuroko. “I’m tired of wiping the floor with this idiot, so—“

“Hey, shut the hell up—“ Kagami started.

Aomine ignored him. “—you wanna ditch him and go make out?” He hooked a thumb over his shoulder. _Please_ , he thought at Kuroko. _Please, please see me._

“No,” said Kuroko coolly. “You can go home if you want, though, I won’t stop you.”

Aomine stared at him, disbelieving, hurt, desperate. He wanted to say, _look, I did what you asked, see how I played nice?_ He wanted to say, _I can’t take seeing you touch him,_ he wanted to say, _why won’t you just remember who we were?_

Kuroko stared back. Immovable. Uncompromising. Seeing him and—refusing.

“You know what?” Aomine said at last, his throat tight, his body thrumming with helpless anger. “ _Fuck_ this.”

He stalked off. When he was around the corner enough that they couldn’t see him, he started to run, letting the wind burn the tears from his eyes before they fell.

+

He didn’t go to school for a week. He did go to practice, a couple times—it was against school policy but somehow no one seemed to care. Aomine figured he was good enough he could probably do anything he fucking wanted, at this point, and the only one who would call him on it was Momoi.

He didn’t talk to Momoi much. She talked to him—pulled him aside and asked him what was wrong immediately, and all he could do was—shake his head and shake her off and walk away, his guilt for it lost in the blankness of his mind. The lethargy and hopelessness he’d just been starting to get past slammed back down in full force, and he spent most of the week asleep, the tracks he kept wearing in his mind making the waking world so tiring he figured. Fuck it.

And then he got a text, and suddenly he could feel everything all at once, in sharp, awful relief.

It was from a number he didn’t have saved in his phone—the same number Kuroko had texted in the group text the day of their date.

 _he loves you_ , Kagami said. _fix this._

Aomine stared at it, his jaw working miserably, his teeth clenched so hard they creaked and ached and his whole face trembled with the effort. He stood up from his bed, abrupt, cracked his knuckles, his eyes burning, his breath coming short and sharp through his nose, not even—not even thinking, his brain gone from dull black to brilliant, squirming, _helpless_ white.

He punched a hole in his apartment wall and went to see Momoi.

“I don’t know what to do,” he said immediately when she opened the door. “I–I don’t know what the fuck to do.”

Momoi let him in, silent. Aomine could feel her eyes on him, evaluating, knowing, in that weird fucking alien way she had and it was almost too much, to have her just—watch him.

“Well?” he snapped. “Help me!”

Momoi closed the door behind him. “You haven’t told me what’s wrong, Dai-chan,” she said calmly.

He whirled on her. “Oh, I need to, now, huh? You don’t just know, looking at me?”

She pressed her lips together in the way she did when he was being unfair, but didn’t he fucking _deserve_ to be a little unfair? What was he supposed to do, sit down to tea and explain step by step the way his heart was breaking?

“Come on,” he snarled, “what the fuck do you think is wrong? Tetsu—“ he stopped, his throat closing around the name.

She leaned against her kitchen counter and waited.

“I,” said Aomine, and swallowed. “I knew he was with Kagami and I thought I could handle seeing them together.” He shook his head, too quickly. “I can’t,” he said. “I—I can’t.”

Momoi’s face was sympathetic, but there was no understanding in her eyes. “You know he loves you, though,” she said. “I get why you’re jealous but—“

“You get why I’m jealous?” Aomine interrupted her. “ _You_. You get it.” His lip twisted. “You just know so much about what it’s like to be in love, huh?”

Momoi’s eyes widened, and there was a small, remote part of Aomine—pushed so far out of the way by his torrent of self-pity and anger and sorrow that he could barely feel it—that hated himself for ever putting that expression on her face. She swallowed hard. “No,” she said, “I don’t, obviously, but—“

“Shut up,” Aomine snapped, pacing across the room and back, across the room and back. “Just—shut the fuck up.”

“Aomine-kun,” she said, a little coldly, “you came to me for advice—“

“I came to you because you’re my friend,” Aomine spat. “Friends help each other, they don’t just—spew bullshit platitudes because they can’t understand regular human emotions!”

Momoi stared at him, her eyes huge in her face. “Right,” she said, her voice a little unsteady, and turned away, pulling her phone from her pocket. Her hair slid out from behind her ears, shadowing her face.

“What are you doing?” Aomine asked, without stopping his pacing.

“Texting someone who does understand regular human emotion,” she said flatly, not looking at him. “And then I’m shutting the fuck up, and you can continue to work yourself into a furious mess if you want, because I couldn’t care less.”

Aomine swallowed, wanting to apologize but not knowing how, not knowing how to do anything important. “Liar,” he said, his voice softer, trying to—extend a hand.

“Asshole,” she snapped back, still looking at her phone. “Sad fucking asshole.” 

He closed his eyes. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah.”

He kept pacing, and she kept staring at her phone—the side of her face lit by its screen, her bottom lip caught between her teeth. Not speaking was oppressive in a way that it _never_ was between them—time spent with her had defined the idea of comfortable silence for Aomine’s whole goddamn life.

Suddenly she hopped up and went to the door, all without looking his way even once.

He clenched his fists and added her to the huge, overwhelming list of things that he’d fucked up lately. He could hear soft voices, and kept his eyes on the middle-distanced, his pacing keeping him—calm, keeping him from screaming.

He felt more than saw Kise enter the room, his presence steady and familiar and such a goddamn relief that Aomine was talking before he’d even figured out what to say. That was the thing about Kise—Aomine knew no matter what he said or did, Kise would could move with him, could respond how he needed him to. He was one of the most versatile and honestly just competent people Aomine knew.

“It’s bullshit, right?” he asked, and his voice cracked as it left his mouth.

“What is?” Kise asked, leaning in the doorway. Aomine wanted to look at him properly, take him in, but his eyes were stinging, aching, and he knew if he stared too long at anything he’d start to cry. 

“Being in love with more than one person,” he said with difficulty. “It’s just—guilt, it’s just falling in love with someone else and not wanting, not wanting to hurt—“ his throat tightened, and it was no fucking use—he looked away too late, his cheeks wet.

Kise saw—Aomine heard him take a sharp breath, and then he was stepping forward, breaking Aomine’s pattern. “It’s not bullshit,” he said, his voice impossibly firm, impossibly sure. “Aominecchi, look at me.”

Aomine closed his eyes, instead, not wanting to look at him in case his face was less sure than his voice.

“It’s not bullshit,” Kise insisted again. “I swear to you, it isn’t, I know that it isn’t.”

Aomine’s breath rattled in his throat. He licked his lips, his eyes still closed. “How?”

There was a short silence, and then, in a voice that wobbled a little, Kise said, “Because that’s been my life for the last four years.”

Aomine opened his eyes, running a hand over his face, confusion taking over enough of his brain that he could get himself under control a little. “What?” he asked. “What? I knew you had a thing for Tetsu—“

“Yeah,” Kise said, with a sigh almost like a laugh. “And.”

Aomine scowled at him. “And? And who?”

Kise met his gaze. His eyes were nervous and pitying and resigned, the gold of their irises almost brown in the dim light, making his exotic, almost too-beautiful face just a little more ordinary. He crossed his arms over his chest like he was holding himself together. “You are neither this stupid nor this cruel, Aominecchi,” he said, his voice deliberately light.

 _Oh_ , thought Aomine. _Oh_. He scrubbed a hand across his face again. What—what could he even say to that, what did Kise need from him—

Kise took another step toward him, holding out a hand. “It doesn’t matter,” he said firmly, as if in answer. “The only thing that matters is that I can—confirm. It’s, ah. Extremely possible to love two people at once.”

Aomine licked his lips. “But,” he started, wanting to ask _when_ , wanting to ask _how_ , wanting to ask _why the fuck didn’t you ever say anything_. But Kise seemed determined not to let him pursue it, and—and Aomine didn’t know what he would do with any of the answers to those questions, so he just. Let them pass.

“What happened?” Kise asked. “Aominecchi, why are you here?”

Aomine sank down onto the edge of Momoi’s futon and tried desperately to begin at the beginning. “We—went on a date, all of us,” he said slowly. “Tetsu texted me to meet him at the mall and then Kagami showed up, and he’d—he planned this thing, where he was hiding and watching us, and.” He frowned. “I don’t know. It was sort of fun, Kagami was surprisingly cool about it.”

Kise watched him, sideways. “But,” he prompted.

Aomine stared down at his hands. They were shaking. “But—I hadn’t really seen them together except on the court. That was bad enough, I thought, I thought, hell, I can handle that, so anything else will be easy, right?” He had—he’d thought there would be _nothing_ as bad as the first time he watched Kagami catch Kuroko’s pass. He shook his head. “I had no idea how it would feel, seeing him in love with someone else.”

Kise went to sit next to him, silent.

“He told me,” Aomine said, because he had, the date itself had been a surprise but the situation wasn’t, he—he should have known it would have to happen eventually. “He said nothing had changed, he said he didn’t want to lose me but he didn’t want to let go of Kagami either so I knew, it was never, like.” He took a long breath, his mind returning to the familiar, torturous memory of Kagami’s mouth on Tetsu’s. “They kissed, and I wanted to tear out Kagami’s lungs with my bare hands.”

“Two things,” Kise said, sounding a little amused. “First, the homicidal urges are something you’re going to need to work on. Second, I find when Kuroko tells you something, he fucking means it.” He frowned. “Wait. Three things. You’re telling me he kissed Kagami and you just left?”

Aomine’s mouth was bitter with misery. “Basically,” he said. “I mean, I asked him if he wanted to go make out first and he said no, and then I left, and I’ve been freaking the fuck out about it for like a week.”

Kise slapped him, hard, across the face. 

It _stung_ —Kise was fucking strong, and he hadn’t held himself back. Aomine reeled, flinging a hand out to try and steady himself, scrabbling at the back of the futon in pain and confusion. “Kise,” he said, raising a hand to his jaw and staring at his friend, “what the fuck?”

Kise glared at him. “You’re telling me that you not only left him there without telling him anything, but this happened a week ago?” His voice was disbelieving, furious. “Fucking hell, I knew you were an asshole but this is—“ he pushed himself to his feet and stared down at Aomine. “I can’t believe you. So you got jealous! Get the fuck over yourself!”

Aomine stared at him, confusion outweighing his anger. Why didn’t anybody get it, he wasn’t _crazy_ , Tetsu was falling for Kagami and he couldn’t fucking stop it. “It wasn’t just jealousy—I really thought he might be trying to leave—“

“So you did the exact thing that made him actually leave you, the first time?” Kise snapped. “Awesome, great strategy.”

Aomine opened his mouth and then closed it again. _You turned your back on me,_ Kuroko’s voice murmured in his head. _You left me behind_. “I didn’t,” he said at last, weak, unsure.

Kise shoved his hands into his hair. “You know what Kurokocchi’s worried about?” he asked. “You might be worrying about how he’s able to love both you and Kagami, but he’s not. That’s not an effort, that’s just a fact. That’s how he feels, and he wouldn’t be able to change it even if he wanted to, which he doesn’t.” He was pacing, now, tracing the same pattern Aomine had been earlier. “What Kuroko’s worried about is whether or not you think it’s worth it to still love him.” He stopped, fixing Aomine with a glare. “Now that it’s maybe a little bit hard. Now that it’s maybe work, and not just him falling into your goddamn lap, no strings attached, willing to do whatever the fuck you want because he thinks the absolute world of you.” He took a breath. “Now that sometimes, it’s going to hurt.”

Aomine drew into himself, horrified. Selfish. Selfish, _again_ —

Kise sighed. “What do you think it looks like,” he asked, “that the first time he asked you to try and put in a little effort, you turned and walked away?”

Aomine needed—needed to hit something, needed to get this horrible, overwhelming self-hatred and frustration out somehow. He pressed his palms together, hard, harder, harder, until his wrists ached with it. “Fuck,” he said. “Fuck, fuck—“

Kise slumped down beside him again. “Yeah.”

Aomine let out an explosive breath. “What the fuck do I do?”

Kise seemed to think about that. “Sleep here tonight,” he said at last. “Momoi won’t mind, and I don’t think you should be alone. In the morning, we’re going shopping.”

Aomine scowled at him. The fuck did he need to go _shopping_ for? “I don’t need fucking retail therapy, Kise, I’m not one of your weird-ass girlfriends—“

Kise smacked him in the shoulder, and Aomine had to fight not to swing back at him—not because he deserved it, or because he was angry, just because he needed something to do with his limbs.

“You want to show Kurokocchi you can make an effort, right?” Kise asked. “Appearances matter, and to be honest, you look like shit.” He levered himself to his feet. “I’ll tell Momoi you’re staying.”

Aomine nodded, flopping down sideways on the futon. Kise started toward the door, and Aomine watched him, let his eyes linger on the breadth of his shoulders, the narrowness of his hips. If he couldn’t fight him, maybe. Maybe they could navigate this tension to someplace new, someplace—it turned out—Kise had been wanting all along, too.

“You don’t think I look like shit,” he said quietly, letting his voice go a little teasing. “You think I look good.”

Kise stopped, the stiffness of his back telling Aomine exactly how wrong that move had been. “Don’t,” he warned, his voice despairing. “Just—don’t.”

Aomine closed his eyes. “Sorry,” he said, and it was cut in half by the slam of the door.

He stayed awake for a long time, staring at the ceiling and waiting for Momoi to come back so he could apologize, but he was exhausted from emotional turmoil and when his eyes slid shut the apartment was still empty and silent around him. 

He would make it better in the morning, he told himself. He would make everything better in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The working title for this fic was "guess who's a fuck-up". Poor Aomine, thrust into situations he has no clue how to handle.
> 
> A lot of these scenes can be read from Kuroko's POV over in [A Liar or a Lover](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3215942), as well as some of what happens next, so if you're reading this first you might not want to spoil yourself. The last scene can be read from Kise's POV in [A Brother In Arms](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3306077), which, again, contains future events from this fic. Aomine has a lot of shit going on, his story takes more time to tell.
> 
> As always - let me know what you think. Love y'all.


	3. Chapter 3

“Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said when he opened the door. “Come in.”

Aomine took a breath and stepped past him, checking around for Kagami. The apartment was empty, though, and he let the breath out in relief and turned. Kuroko was watching him, looking him up and down, and Aomine flushed a little. “What?”

Kuroko raised an eyebrow at him. “You look good.”

“You think so?” Aomine smirked a little. He would have to text Kise and thank him (again); his friend had told him the same thing before they parted—his usual flirty smile just a little off, a little tentative, like he didn’t know what Aomine might make of it. Aomine honestly didn’t really know either. “I—talked to Kise,” he said slowly.

“Oh?” asked Kuroko.

Aomine bit his lip. “Yeah, he—“ he started, and then stopped. He almost said, _he told me he was in love with me_ , but Kise was right—it didn’t matter. Not right now. They could talk that complicated shit out later, if. If Kuroko forgave him.

He sighed. “I was really shitty to you,” he said, searching for words, trying to—put everything he’d been feeling over the last week into something resembling sense. “I got jealous and I couldn’t deal with the idea that we wouldn’t just go back to—how it was, how we were, at Teiko. It was driving me crazy, Tetsu, I.” He stopped, his mind slipping back into the circular track of the memory of that kiss, of the fond way Kagami had looked at him, of the fond way Kuroko looked back. “I don’t get it,” he said, his voice coming out small, “Why do you need him? Wasn’t it enough for you? Aren’t—aren’t I—“

An older, even more well-worn memory took over—Kuroko curled in his arms, looking up at him, the same question on his lips.

“Stop it,” Kuroko said. “Aomine— _Daiki_ , stop,” and he stepped forward, face fierce and certain, and gave the answer Aomine couldn’t, lying in the dark a little over a year before. “Of course you’re enough,” he said, “of course.”

It robbed Aomine of his strength completely, and he sagged. He didn’t, he didn’t _deserve_ this. He held out his arms, needing to touch him, confirm.

But Kuroko stepped back again as soon as he moved, and Aomine was left hanging, confused and still a little desperate.

Kuroko swallowed. “But—I don’t want to go back to how we were, and neither should you.” He held Aomine’s eyes. “If how we were had been perfect, you never would have turned your back on me, and I never would have walked away.”

Aomine licked his lips, but knew he was right. If everything had been perfect, he would have been able to tell Kuroko he was enough, too.

Kuroko crossed his arms. “I _could_ just date you,” he said, his tone of voice making it clear that it wasn’t a suggestion. “I don’t want to, and it would break my heart, but I could do it, because our relationship—our relationship now, with me in love with Kagami as well, it’s still enough.” He took a breath. “I could also just date him, for the same reason.”

Aomine swallowed. “But it would break your heart?” he asked, hopeful.

Kuroko’s lips trembled. “Like you wouldn’t believe,” he said, rueful, and Aomine reached for him again, drew him in close, wrapping him up in his arms and nudging in close. “Sorry,” he muttered against his mouth, in between little gulps of air, “ _sorry_ , fuck—“

Kuroko laughed a little, and they weren’t even really kissing so much as breathing together. “It’s a good thing I find you apologizing so sexy,” he joked, and Aomine wrapped his arms around his shoulders and just held on.

Neither of them moved until Kuroko’s kettle started boiling, and then Kuroko pulled away, crossing to his stovetop. “Tea?” he offered, the corner of his mouth curling up, amused, maybe, at the ridiculousness of such a small, domestic thing in the face of such overwhelming feelings.

Aomine shoved a hand into his hair. It was sticky against his fingers and he was probably messing up whatever magic Kise had worked on him but he couldn’t quite manage to care. “Uh,” he said, “sure.”

“You know,” Kuroko said, getting down his teapot, “Kagami understood all this much faster, because Kagami actually listens when I explain something the first time.”

Aomine glared at him. “You tell me it’s not a competition, and then you go and say shit like that.”

Kuroko smiled at him, mischievous. “I’m kidding, and anyway, he has an advantage.” He poured the water into the pot. The steam rose in a cloud between them, making Kuroko look soft and distant, and Aomine still hadn’t touched him enough for his liking, his body still kind of shaky with need for a fight, or a fuck, or a really good game. 

“He doesn’t have our history, for one thing,” Kuroko continued, “and I was already kind of with you again before we got together.”

Aomine tucked his hands into his pockets, trying to calm himself down. “The no sex thing probably helps, too,” he suggested.

Kuroko made a noncommittal kind of noise. “Plus,” he added, “he knows he better suck it the hell up and make his peace with you.” He smirked at Aomine.

Aomine stared at him for a long time. That asshole, that fucking _dick_. He clenched his jaw, looking around for something he could safely destroy. Finally he settled for kicking one of Kuroko’s floor cushions, hard. It bounced harmlessly off the wall, ricocheted off the ceiling, and landed on the couch. “That son of a bitch,” he snapped. “I can’t believe he told you—that’s gotta be some kind of violation of some, some honor system, like a, a—“

“A boyfriend code?” Kuroko suggested, raising an eyebrow.

Aomine calmed down a little—lashing out, even in such a small way, had helped. “Is that what we are?” he asked. “We never really. Said.”

“Kagami and I are. Me and you?” Kuroko bit his lip. “I’d like that.”

Aomine nodded. So would he. “And—me and him, what are we?”

Kuroko cocked his head at him. “Whatever you can be,” he said. “Maybe we’ll start with ‘able to spend time in the same place for more than an hour without freaking out and storming away.’”

Aomine flushed. “Yeah,” he said grudgingly. Kise glared at him in his head, snapped, _make the effort, Aominecchi_ , and he took a breath, straightened up. “Yeah.”

Kuroko brought him his tea, setting it down on the table beside him, and Aomine reached out to run his fingers over his jaw, gentle, just—grounding himself.

Kuroko smiled at him. “He was right about you, you know,” he said.

Aomine raised his eyebrows. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

Kuroko shook his head. “It’s good,” he said. “He said that you loved me and you’d be back.” His eyes got a little distant, a little sad. “Told me it any time I thought you might just be. Leaving.” He swallowed, dropping his eyes.

Aomine ran his hands up his neck, tilting his head up so Kuroko had to look at him, pushed every iota of sincerity into his voice he could. “I wasn’t going to leave.”

Kuroko’s eyes slipped closed, and he leaned in, kissing Aomine slow and tender. Aomine wrapped a hand around the nape of his neck and kissed back, sliding his tongue against Kuroko’s lips, and Kuroko opened for him willingly, stepping closer so he was standing between Aomine’s knees. They kissed slick and sloppy, again and again, until they were both panting from it, Kuroko’s hands resting hot on Aomine’s thighs, his tea going cold at his elbow. 

“Tetsu,” Aomine said, kissing him on the cheekbone. “Tetsu.”

“Nn,” sighed Kuroko as Aomine worked his way downward, pressing slow, open-mouthed kisses along his jaw and throat, licking at the drumroll of his pulse. The bruise he’d left against his collarbone had faded almost entirely, and he sealed his mouth there again, overwriting the mark of desperate sadness with one of the jumbled up happiness, relief and determination he felt now, flicking his tongue against the skin trapped between his lips, and Kuroko’s breath came faster, harsher. He ran his nails up Aomine’s thighs, shifted his thumbs to trace them over Aomine’s fly, and Aomine broke suction with a _pop_. 

“Gh, no,” he said, and Kuroko stilled questioningly. “Let me,” Aomine started, and shifted his hands up Kuroko’s throat to his face again, thumbed over his parted lips, nearly bit his tongue when Kuroko drew one of his fingers into his mouth. “L-let me,” Aomine tried again as Kuroko sucked lightly, his tongue against the pad of Aomine’s finger, his eyes dark as he looked at him through lowered lashes. “Fuck—let me make _you_ feel good, dammit,” he managed, finally.

Kuroko blinked slow at him, drawing teasingly back so Aomine’s finger stayed pillowed on his lower lip. “You always make me feel good,” he said, his mouth curling up.

Aomine shrugged, ran his hands up into Kuroko’s hair. Kuroko hummed, turned into his touch, his eyes slipping closed. “Sure,” Aomine said, his mouth dry with how fucking gorgeous he was, happy and comfortable in Aomine’s hands, a little flushed, a little smiling, his eyelashes sweeping his cheeks. “But.”

Kuroko twisted so he could kiss Aomine’s wrist, nip at his pulse point in return, and then he opened his eyes. “Okay,” he said. “I’m intrigued.”

Aomine pulled him forward to kiss him again and then kept pulling him until they were flush together, ran his hands down the planes of his back to his ass and picked him up. Kuroko laughed against his mouth, lifting his legs over Aomine’s hips and hooking his feet together above his ass, and Aomine could feel the half-hard weight of his cock against his stomach. He bit at Kuroko’s mouth as he maneuvered them into the bedroom, going to his knees with difficulty by the bed so Kuroko was perched on its edge. He ran a hand down Kuroko’s leg to get him to unhook them and Kuroko did, kissing whatever parts of Aomine’s face he could.

Aomine pulled back a little to look at him, sitting back on his ankles between Kuroko’s knees. If, if he were someone else, he would say something, would know how to say something, would be able to put into words all the things he meant.

He wasn’t, though, and maybe in this moment he didn’t need to be, because Kuroko met his eyes—Kuroko trailed quick, clever fingers down his jaw—Kuroko smiled wide and knowing and breathed, “yeah.”

Aomine shoved upward, crashing their mouths together and tipping Kuroko over backwards. He yelped with laughter that slid into a surprised, gasping moan when Aomine ground the heel of his hand against his cock. He stopped as soon as he’d started, going instead to push Kuroko’s shirt up his chest and kiss and lick at his abs, leaning down over him, touching everywhere he could, letting himself—move, like he’d wanted to for days, releasing all the pent up need in his system he could.

He really, absolutely had meant to take this slow, tease Kuroko the way Kuroko was so good at with him, but now it was happening he just—wanted to make him feel as _much_ as he could, translate the terrible, overwhelming emotion of the last few days into wonderful, overwhelming pleasure, drive any sorrow and sadness from Kuroko’s body as thoroughly as he could. He shoved Kuroko’s shirt up and over his head, leaving it tangled around his elbows, and then went to work on his fly, tugging his jeans and underwear down his legs halfway in one move and leaving them, too, so Kuroko had something to struggle against. Kuroko stared up at him, the pale, perfect stretch of him—his face, his throat, his chest, his flushed cock and slim, muscled thighs—framed above and below by the darkness of his clothes. As Aomine stared, he raised an ice-blue eyebrow. “So, Aomine-kun,” he said, a little breathless. “What now?”

Aomine swallowed hard and leaned down over him, latched his mouth around one of his nipples, taking the other one between two fingers and tugging, tugging. Kuroko’s hips were twitching against the air, his face turned into his own bicep like he was trying to hide or stifle himself, but he couldn’t, quite, little moans slipping through his lips anyway.

Aomine used his free hand to hold him down, wrapping his fingers around his hip, and Kuroko snapped, “shit,” twitched against his hold. Aomine slid his thumb down his stomach, traced circles through the trail of hair that led to his cock, and scraped his teeth across Kuroko’s nipple before moving downward, kissing patterns across his ribs. He slid his other hand up, worked it over Kuroko’s throat and jaw until he found his mouth, and Kuroko took a long, shuddering breath before wrapping his lips around his fingers again. He wasn’t nearly as teasing—sucking and nipping at his skin desperately—and Aomine felt a surge of pride along with the blinding wave of arousal that brought. “God, Tetsu, your _mouth_ ,” he murmured against Kuroko’s stomach, and traced his hand down, again, running slick fingers over the muscles of Kuroko’s chest. 

“Y-you’re one to fucking talk,” Kuroko replied, shakily, laughing, his tongue slipping across his smiling lips like he missed Aomine’s hand already, and Aomine hummed and set about proving his point.

Kuroko thrust into his mouth as soon as soon as Aomine touched him, something that might have been an apology lost in the torrent of syllables dropping from his lips, and Aomine closed his eyes and worked with him, bobbing his head as quick and smooth as he could. He was a little out of practice but Kuroko didn’t seem to care—he fought against the tangle of his shirt, trying to get his hands to Aomine’s head, maybe, and Aomine slowed, teasing, pulled off to lick at him instead until Kuroko started cursing at him, and then swallowed him back down. His hands were clamped around Kuroko’s thighs so he could feel him tense and tremble, knew the way he shivered and shook and when, exactly, to—

He pulled off completely and stood up, and Kuroko arched, his hips lifting off the bed entirely at the sudden lack of contact. His eyes flew open. “A—Aomine—“

Aomine shoved off his jeans with trembling hands, nearly tipping over in his haste, rifled through the drawer by the bed for lube and condoms. They didn’t do it this way often—not because Kuroko didn’t like it, but because being fucked was the one time in his life Aomine surrendered control completely and he knew Kuroko loved that as much as he did. But today it wasn’t about him—wasn’t about what _he_ needed—and he slicked himself up with careful fingers, Kuroko’s gaze flickering over him, up and down.

“Wanna touch you,” Kuroko said, his voice a little hoarse, twisting against the bonds of his shirt. “Please.”

Aomine swallowed, nodded, took his place again between his knees. He tugged off Kuroko’s jeans, first, ran his nails up his thighs but didn’t touch him, and Kuroko made a noise halfway between a sigh and a sob. Aomine smirked and leaned down over him. He nudged Kuroko’s face around so he could kiss him while he reached up to free his arms, and as soon as Kuroko could move his hands were on Aomine’s back, pulling him closer, clutching and scratching at his skin. Aomine breathed harsh against his jaw and ran a hand down his side, over his hip, slid their cocks together once so he could gather lube and precum with one swipe of his hand, and then traced his fingers lower. Kuroko was chanting his name in little broken pieces as Aomine worked him open slow and thorough, and when he finally sank into him Kuroko arched, his mouth opening soundlessly against Aomine’s temple.

“Well,” he said, after, curled trembling into Aomine’s side. There was warmth blooming outward from Aomine’s heart to the tips of his goddamn fingers, warmth making his brain soft and fond, warmth he saw reflected in Kuroko’s eyes. “We should fight more often, Aomine-kun.”

Aomine shook his head. “Nope.” He kissed Kuroko’s cheekbone, small and featherlight, over and over, and Kuroko laughed at him, batting him away.

“Good,” he said, more breath than word. “Good.”

Aomine watched him for a while, and then bit his lip. “Can I ask you for advice on something?”

Kuroko pulled away a little to look at him properly. “Always,” he said easily.

Aomine took a breath. “I—” he swallowed. “I was pretty awful to Satsuki, last night.”

Kuroko frowned. “I was wondering why you’d spoken to Kise and not to her,” he said. “Usually she’s got your back pretty completely.”

Aomine winced. “She tried to. I didn’t let her.” He sighed. “It sucks, because I know her so well and it’s so tempting, when I’m pissed, to hit her where it really hurts and I finally did and I don’t—I don’t know why, I know the shit I said isn’t true, I just.”

Kuroko squirmed around so he was resting on Aomine’s chest, his chin on his hands. “I know why,” he said, eyes serious. “She tried to tell you something you didn’t want to hear, and you were too angry to listen so you found a reason to discount her.”

“She—did say basically the same shit as Kise, or tried to,” Aomine admitted. He grinned a little. “She just didn’t hit me in the face first.”

Kuroko laughed, burying his head in Aomine’s chest. “Maybe she should have.”

Aomine scowled down at him, but he couldn’t get it to stay on his face. “Cruel, Tetsu,” he said, disgustingly fond.

Kuroko lifted his head, reached up to trace over Aomine’s brow, his nose, the corner of his mouth. “Want me to go with you to apologize?”

Aomine made faces against his fingers and thought about that. “No,” he said at last. His relationship with Momoi was— _his_ , to fuck up and to fix, and it felt like a disservice to bring anyone else into it, even Kuroko. “But. Thank you.”

Kuroko nodded. He dropped his eyes, and then raised them again. “Do,” he started, and then stopped. “Can I call Kagami? I told him I would, when you came back.”

Aomine licked his lips, wanting to say no, but. He took a long breath. “Yeah,” he said. “Go ahead.”

Kuroko stared at him, his lower lip between his teeth, and then leaned up and kissed him, hard, before scrambling away to get his phone. He settled back on the bed, cross-legged and still naked, and dialed.

Aomine reached out and drew lines up and down his spine, just to remind him he was still there.

“Kagami-kun,” Kuroko said, staring at his knees, his lips curling upward. “He came back.” He paused for a minute, and then laughed, and said, “Yeah. Okay.” His eyes slid sideways to Aomine’s face, and there was a weird breathless moment where Aomine couldn’t tell if he was smiling at him or because of Kagami’s voice on the phone and it didn’t actually matter because he looked happier than Aomine had ever seen him in his _life_ and, okay. Yeah.

“Okay,” Kuroko was saying, turning back away a little, and Aomine reached out to pluck the phone from his grip. Kuroko yelped and reached for it, but Aomine dodged, rolling off the other edge of the bed and onto his feet and putting the phone to his ear.

“You still there?” Kagami was asking. “What—”

Aomine cut him off. “Kagami.”

Kagami went silent for a second, and then he said cautiously, “Aomine.”

Aomine stared at his feet, ignored Kuroko’s gaze boring holes in his back. “Silver platter,” he said. “Right?”

There was a second where he thought Kagami wouldn’t understand—thought maybe he’d forgotten the taunt at the mall— _don’t you want to give him everything he wants?_ —and then he said, his voice sure, “Yeah. Anything and everything.”

Aomine swallowed. “Me, too,” he said. “So.”

“Yeah,” said Kagami.

“Good,” said Aomine. “And—” he remembered Kagami’s text, how angry it had made him, how much he’d needed that anger. “Thank you,” he said, and flipped the phone closed.

He tossed it to Kuroko, who caught it, narrowing his eyes at him. “What was that?”

Aomine widened his eyes solemnly. “Sorry. Boyfriend code,” he said, and dodged, laughing, when Kuroko threw a pillow at his head.

+

Momoi avoided him all day on Monday. He finally caught up with her after school—there was no practice today—and fell in beside her, hands in his pockets, silent.

She was silent, too, for a few strides, and then she said coolly, “Can I help you with something, Aomine-kun?”

Aomine licked his lips. “I was hoping I could walk you home.”

Momoi sighed. “Okay,” she said, without looking at him.

Aomine frowned at the ground in front of his feet as they walked on. “I didn’t mean it,” he said, because that was the most important thing. “Tetsu said I lashed out because I didn’t want to hear what you had to say, and I think that’s true, and I’m. I’m really sorry.”

Momoi glanced at him, just a flicker of eyes through her hair. “If he’s giving you advice you guys must be okay,” she said quietly.

Aomine nodded, his lip between his teeth. “We—we are, yeah.”

Momoi took a breath. “Good,” she said. “I’m glad.” They walked in silence for another minute, and then she continued, “For—for selfish reasons, too.” She looked at the sky. “I thought maybe you were coming to me because Kise’s advice hadn’t worked, and you were reverting to me as, as default.” Her lips twisted. “Second best.”

Aomine stopped, staring at her. “You’re not second best.”

She turned to look at him properly for the first time, and he saw that her eyes were red. “Dai-chan,” she said steadily, “no one could listen to you talk for years about the great transformative love you have without feeling like they’re second best.” She raised her eyebrows. “Then again, I thought nobody could listen to me talk for years about how I’ll never fall in love and still think it was a good idea to remind me how broken I am, so.”

“You’re not broken,” Aomine said immediately, stepping toward her, and she shook her head, looking away, her eyes shifting constantly so they didn’t have time to gather tears. “You’re not,” he said again. “You wouldn’t be so upset with me if you couldn’t feel human emotions.”

Momoi licked her lips. “Great,” she murmured, “so I only get the bad ones.”

“No,” said Aomine, “I’ve—you—I’ve seen you so happy I thought you might explode from it, I’ve seen you angry, I.” He gnawed on his lip. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Satsuki. And you’re not second best. I—it’s just _different_ , with Tetsu, it’s not—” He cut himself off, blinked at his feet for a minute, and then snorted a laugh.

She stared at him, baffled.

He shook his head. “I just realized I was literally about to give you the same speech Tetsu gave me about Kagami,” he said, grinning, willing her to get the joke.

She blinked wetly, but her lips twitched. He sighed and stepped up to her, skimmed his hands up her arms. “I told myself I’d fix this on my own, but he’s here helping me anyway.” He took a breath. “You’re not less important to me. You’re—if—” he made a frustrated noise. “I wouldn’t be _shit_ without you, you know? And if I somehow gave you the impression that I would be, I’m a better actor than I thought.”

She wiped a hand over her face, didn’t resist when he pulled her in. “The opposite,” she said into his chest. “You’re a terrible actor and you think you’re awesome.”

“Harsh,” he muttered, and pressed a kiss into her hair.

She pulled away from him and continued to walk, and he fell in by her side again, their steps somehow more synchronized, his heart a little lighter. “It’s just—” she said, and swallowed. “It’s just. I don’t talk about it, you know? Not really, not to anyone except you, and I thought that meant you’d be the one who wouldn’t hurt me.” She shook her head. “Instead I just gave you the tools to hurt me most.”

“I’m an asshole,” he said fervently as they reached her building. “A sad fucking asshole.”

She trotted up her steps, turned at her door. “Not so sad,” she said, smiling a little. “Not anymore.”

Aomine bit his lip and rolled his shoulders, watching her. She was so—effortlessly gorgeous, red-rimmed eyes and all. Some of the misery was gone from her face and he was fiercely proud of that, even if he was the one to put it there in the first place. “Yeah, well,” he said. “Got you to thank for that.”

She made a face. “Kise, mostly,” she countered. “Probably Tetsu-kun had something to do with it too.”

He shook his head. “I have you to thank for Kise,” he countered. “And if I’d just listened to you we wouldn’t have needed him at all.”

She shrugged. “I dunno about that.” Her face was calmer, considering, and finally she lifted a shoulder in a gesture toward her door. “You wanna come in?” She pushed her hair out of her face. “I was gonna shower, you can. Join, if you want.”

Aomine nodded, relief flooding his body. “Yes,” he said immediately. “Please.”

She pressed her lips together in a curled smirk and reached out to him, pulling him up the stairs by the wrist. “Remember,” she said, looking up at him through her lashes as she unlocked her door, “you owe me.”

 _More than I can ever repay,_ he thought, and followed her inside.

+

Kuroko and Kagami were waiting for him at the train station, standing shoulder to shoulder, their hands brushing but not linked. Kuroko stepped forward when they saw him and leaned up to kiss his cheek, and Aomine—with an effort—didn’t dodge and turn it into a kiss on the mouth.

Maybe Kagami saw his effort; maybe he was just keeping the half-spoken promise from their phone conversation, but there was respect in his eyes when they exchanged nods, a respect Aomine grudgingly returned.

“You smell good,” Kuroko remarked absently, and narrowed his eyes. “You made up with Momoi-san?”

Aomine coughed, embarrassed. “Yeah,” he said, “mostly, I’m—not great at apologies.”

“Shocker,” Kagami muttered, and Aomine glared at him.

Kuroko gave Kagami a quelling look, and then raised an eyebrow at Aomine. “I don’t know,” he said teasingly, “you gave me a pretty good one the other day.”

Aomine smirked at him. Beyond him he saw Kagami roll his eyes, but he didn’t look particularly upset—that was good, it was good they could talk about sex around him. 

Kuroko lead the way off the train platform and away into the streets; Aomine trailed after him, Kagami at his side. He felt like—like a bodyguard, or something, the two of them flanking their smaller boyfriend. It wasn’t necessarily a bad feeling.

“Momoi-san kind of scares me,” Kagami remarked. “How the hell did she control all of you Miracles monsters at once?”

Aomine stiffened, the word sinking into his bones in a way he hadn’t felt in years. 

Kagami noticed—his weird eyebrows twitched upward. “What—”

Aomine shook his head. “Nothing, just. Don’t call me that, yeah?”

Kagami frowned at him. “Okay,” he said. “Sure.”

Aomine looked away. “She didn’t, really,” he said. “Didn’t really need her to control us when Akashi was around. She’s a fantastic coach, though,” he said, because it was true. “She made our team at Touo into something—” he smirked, “well, something that could beat you.”

Kagami scoffed. “Your team didn’t beat me,” he said, “you did.”

Aomine glanced at him, startled, the compliment settling warm and surprising into his stomach.

“It’s true, Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said over his shoulder.

Aomine worked his mouth, pleased despite himself. “Yeah, well,” he said. “What about you? Your coach, Riko, she seems to know what she’s doing.”

Kuroko laughed. “Maybe too well.”

“Yeah,” said Kagami ruefully, “speaking of scary.”

“You must be used to that, though,” Aomine said, because he was trying, and because he was kind of genuinely curious. “You must have had some pretty intense coaches in America.”

They’d reached the streetball court that had to be Kuroko’s destination; he turned and spread his arms like a magician and Aomine wanted to kiss him in appreciation, because if there was one way he could stand to hang out with Kagami it was if they were playing basketball.

“Oh yeah,” Kagami said. “They’ll throw you to the wolves over there.” He unzipped his bag and spun his basketball on the tip of a finger, dribbled it a few times, and then nudged Aomine with a shoulder. “Up for a game of HORSE? Loser buys dinner?”

He said the word in English, and Aomine, startled, turned to look at Kuroko, who looked just as baffled. Slowly Aomine asked, also in English, “ _whores?_ ”

“ _Horse_ ,” Kagami snapped in Japanese, and then back to English. “Horse.”

“Isn’t that the same word?” Aomine asked Kuroko. “Do they use the same word for horse and prostitute?”

“I don’t think so,” Kuroko said, his eyebrows drawn together.

Kagami ignored them. “It’s an American game you play with a basketball,” he said. “Horse is spelled—“ he hesitated—“H-O-R—uh—E-S. I think. And someone makes a shot from anywhere, like.” He barely shifted from his casual, explaining-things stance, making a three point shot almost absently, and Aomine raised his eyebrows. That was new.

“And then,” Kagami continued casually, though he looked a little smug at Aomine’s surprise, “you have to make the same shot, in the same style. If you do, I take another shot. If you don’t—“

“I will,” Aomine said, smirking.

Kagami smirked back. “If you don’t,” he said again, “you get a letter, starting with H and going on through the word, O, R, and so on, and then you take your own shot, from wherever you want, however you want, and I have to try and make yours.”

Aomine waved a hand. “I get it. Whoever spells out the word loses.”

Kagami nodded, holding his eyes. “You up for it?”

Aomine rolled his shoulders. “Let’s go,” he said, and grinned. This was more fucking like it.

Kuroko settled down to watch at his side, and Aomine smiled down at him for a minute—he was beautiful, pale and happy in the twilight—before turning his eyes back to Kagami.

The other ace dribbled, unhurried, confidence pouring out of him. Aomine squinted. He was somehow—brighter than when he’d first seen him, the banked fires of his heart glowing hotter, and Aomine itched to be out there defending, match up against him again for real. It was better than playing Kise, he realized with a start; not only did he not know his style as well, the difference between one game and the next with Kagami was even more pronounced.

“C’mon, idiot,” he called, feeling—great, feeling excited. “Hurry it up.”

Kagami turned, smirked at him—challenging in a way that stuck under Aomine’s ribs and pulled upward—and charged the net, throwing himself upward with a beautiful, soaring speed. At the apex of his arc—so high his arms were entirely above the net—he tossed the ball directly up, clapped his hands together once above the hoop, and dropped without ever touching the rim.

The ball hit the court a second or so after Kagami did, the net swishing in its wake.

Aomine licked his lips, nearly muttered _holy shit_ aloud, but Kuroko would probably hear and make fun of him. He kept his mouth shut, instead, glanced at his boyfriend, who was looking proud and expectant, and then looked back at Kagami, whose expectation was of an entirely different kind, not—hostile, not anymore, but cocky as _hell_.

Aomine took the court, caught the ball between his hands, and prepared himself.

“C’mon, idiot,” Kagami called—to break his concentration, he was sure—voice mocking, “hurry it up!”

Aomine flipped him off, took another moment, and then threw himself toward the net.

He almost had it—his speed was right, his timing was perfect—but he felt the muscles in his legs shift wrong, felt himself not put enough into the jump, and his lips twisted as he flew toward the net. Maybe if he threw the ball a little higher and sooner—there—he’d still have time to clap before it fell again.

He slapped his hands together, flickered his arms outward again so as not to break his wrists on the hoop—Kagami played _hardcore_ —and dropped to the court, feeling it in his knees.

The ball hit the back rim of the hoop and bounced off the wrong way, ricocheting across the court.

Aomine punched the air in frustration. “Fuck!”

“That was amazing, Aomine-kun,” Kuroko called, admiring.

Kagami, however, was pleased in a way that made Aomine itch. “That’s H,” he called. “Take your own shot, Aomine.”

Aomine retrieved the basketball. “Oh,” he said darkly, “I’ll take my shot.”

It wasn’t hard to figure out a shot Kagami couldn’t make. He was strong as fuck—stronger maybe in his legs than Aomine himself—but he didn’t have Aomine’s control, his finesse. Aomine ran lightly up to the net, not putting much of his weight into any of his movements. He planted his feet just inside the out-of-bounds line, directly under the net, leaned way out over it, tossed the ball up over the back board, leaned back inside while it was in the air, launched off the ground, and alley-ooped it to himself, dunking it easily and landing on his toes.

Kagami, like the big lunk he was, overbalanced and landed flat on his goddamn face. His expression when he picked himself up off the floor was so funny Aomine doubled over with laughter, pressing a hand to his eyes to get himself under control. He almost lost it again when he opened his eyes to find Kagami glaring at him, gravel clinging to his cheek.

“That’s H,” he called, breathless, and glanced down at Kuroko while Kagami lined up his next shot.

His boyfriend was staring at him, eyebrows up. Aomine nudged him with a toe. “S’up?”

“Nothing,” Kuroko said after a minute. “It’s just been a while since I’ve seen you laugh like that.”

Aomine ran a hand over his jaw. “Yeah,” he admitted. “Well.”

Kuroko smiled and reached up to hook his index finger through Aomine’s pinky.

“Oi,” Kagami called, “It doesn’t fucking work if you’re not watching, asshole!”

Aomine rolled his eyes, forcing himself to look away from Kuroko’s profile and pay attention to Kagami again. “Whatever,” he called back, “that was obviously your ace in the hole, it’s all down hill from here.”

It wasn’t.

The next hour was one of the most frustrating of Aomine’s life. Kagami was a fucking _powerhouse_ , his crazy trick shots all about his insane jumping ability, the one thing Aomine was starting to admit to himself he couldn’t actually match. 

It pissed him off—he was _better_ than Kagami was, he knew he was, had proven it in their game—but every time he left the court to watch him take a shot Kuroko reached up and linked their fingers together, and somehow he couldn’t bring himself to really hold on to any of his anger. When Kagami pulled some of the craziest shit he’d ever seen—lofting the ball, throwing himself upward faster, catching it at the apex of its arc and pushing it upward again before landing and tipping it casually through the hoop with the tip of one long finger—and then jogged over, laughing, to kiss Kuroko on the cheek, Aomine just clenched his jaw and shook his head, because Kuroko never broke that contact, that casual touch.

Even Kagami’s normal dunks, which he resorted to when Aomine yelled at him too much for taking too long, shook the frame of the basketball hoop. The downward force he was able to exert from the heights he reached—and reached every time, Aomine had broken some basketball hoops in his day but not like this—was utterly ridiculous. Kagami was breathing hard by the time they’d both reached H-O-R, clearly showing off for Kuroko (and maybe, Aomine like to think, a little bit for him, too) and he never actually made any of Aomine’s trick shots, but, god, he made Aomine work.

Didn’t make him any less annoying, though.

“Fucking hell, Aomine, would you just take your damn shot?” he growled, arms crossed. “We got dinner riding on this. You trying to make us starve?”

“Don’t tempt me,” Aomine snapped back. “Maybe if you want to eat you should start making some of your shots.”

“Same to you, asshole,” Kagami retorted, and Aomine bared his teeth at him.

Kuroko stood up. “I’ll buy dinner,” he said clearly.

Aomine blinked at him. “What?”

Kagami turned, too. “But—”

Kuroko smiled, his eyes warm. “It makes sense, right? Since I’m the one taking you on a date.”

Aomine glanced at Kagami, who looked back, eyebrows raised. Aomine shrugged, and wandered over to Kuroko, slinging an arm around his shoulders. He wasn’t sure where the line was, contact-wise, but he wasn’t about to be all weird about it. If Kagami had a problem, he could fuck off or talk it out like a man. “Cute boy wants to buy us dinner?” he said casually, the _us_ as much of a peace offering as he was willing to give, “I’m not complaining.

Kuroko seemed pleased enough—turned his head a little, pressed a kiss to his bicep despite how sweaty Aomine was—but Kagami watched them for a moment, still frowning. Finally his gaze slid off Aomine’s face to Kuroko’s, and he relaxed. “Sure,” he said, and reached out to take the hand Kuroko offered.

They walked that way to the restaurant Kuroko had chosen, their boyfriend strung between them, and Aomine—his muscles aching and his brain firing faster than he could remember in a long time—felt like maybe he could actually get used to this shit.

He really had to do something good to thank Kise, but. That involved actually talking to Kise, and he had no idea what he would say, how to acknowledge both his help and the. Other stuff they’d talked about.

He imagined just hanging out with him, the way they used to, playing him one on one, or. He laughed a little. “Remind me never to play whores with Kise,” he muttered to Kuroko. “It’s like the game was fuckin’ made for him.”

Kuroko laughed. “That sounds like a reason to do it, not a reason not to.”

Kagami chimed in, his voice surprisingly wicked. “Make sure you don’t call it _whores_ when you invite him, he might get the wrong idea.”

Aomine snorted, and Kuroko reached out to poke Kagami in the side. “Listen to you, making sex jokes.”

Kagami rolled his eyes at him. “Just because I don’t _have_ it doesn’t mean I can’t _joke_ about it.”

Aomine shook his head. “Still can’t believe you don’t want sex,” he muttered. 

Kagami raised an eyebrow at him. “Of course you can’t,” he said, his voice somehow making it an insult.

Aomine scowled at him. “What the fuck is that even supposed to mean—”

“Shh, both of you,” Kuroko commanded, and pulled the door of the restaurant open. “Food.”

Aomine glared at Kagami, and Kagami glared back. Aomine wanted to snap, _maybe you’re an asshole because you never let loose_ , wanted to snap, _just because I’m sleeping with your boyfriend doesn’t mean you get to make snide comments about my sex life because guess what, dickbag, he’s my boyfriend too_ , wanted to be quick and clean about it and just trip Kagami into the nearest wall, no words necessary, but—

But. Silver platter, and. And there was something Momoi had said, stepping out of her jeans and into the shower: “You know why I would fall in love with Tetsu-kun, if I could, and not you?”

Aomine had shook his head, only half listening, his mind caught in the small of her back, the curve of her ass.

“Because you treat your truth and objective truth as if they’re the same,” she said, and turned, her hair going darker, slicker pink under the spray, “whereas Tetsu—he knows that something that for him is wonderful, or even just possible, might be terrible or impossible for someone else.” She smiled at him, a little, water droplets clinging to her lips. “He sees people as they are, not as deviations from what he thinks they should be.”

Aomine followed Kagami into the restaurant, sat across from him at the table, and tried to see him like Kuroko did.

His conception of Kagami had always been, basically: big, angry, loud, annoying as hell. And on the court, he was. When he was fighting, he was. But Aomine kept watching, that dinner date and after—whenever the three of them hung out, which happened more and more—and he saw other stuff, the stuff Kagami was under all the bluster. There was a kind of. Silence, to him, a calm and calming centeredness to the way he lived his life.

It made Aomine feel weird, because his own anger, his own energy, came from a frenetic kind of—need, a drive to be the best, always, thrumming away under his skin. And it wasn’t that Kagami wasn’t determined to be the best—every time he took the court he showed just how deep that resolve went—it was just. He could almost. Turn it off.

So of course Aomine did his very best to turn it back on again, in any way he could, not even riling Kagami up because he didn’t like him, anymore—reframing his situation from _I have to share Tetsu_ to _I get to share Tetsu_ was not quick work, but it was happening, and it did wonders for his opinion of the other ace. It helped that Kagami was obviously deadly serious about their pact to make Kuroko happy. Aomine could probably forgive a man for murder if he promised he did it to make Kuroko happy.

They still fought—mostly at Aomine’s instigation—but it started becoming almost routine, familiar, comfortable, and he stopped wanting to strangle him or tear out his throat when he and Kuroko kissed. Kagami, for his part, had never gotten as angry as Aomine did when he saw the two of them kissing, but he stopped twitching, the little line between his eyebrows disappearing.

It was almost funny, how much more he cared about Aomine and Kuroko snuggling, or running together, or playing basketball than he did about them having sex, even going so far as to let them hook up in his apartment. Aomine supposed that was what Momoi had meant—did his best to see Kagami’s own objective truth, where sex didn’t matter; there was only love.

It was hard. It was hard, especially, because as soon as he started watching Kagami closely to try and understand him, he also started watching Kagami closely in general, and the little joke he’d made to Momoi, just to make her smile, the little acknowledgement of Kagami’s eyes and how good he looked playing basketball, it. Snowballed. 

He supposed it made sense that seeing Kagami like Kuroko did included seeing him as attractive, but that didn’t really make it _fair_.

He hung out at Seirin, sometimes, after practice or on those days when he skipped out on Momoi and the rest of Touo, because he might not be feeling the way he had in middle school anymore but come on, it still wasn’t like anyone could match him. The three of them had pretty regular plans to hang out after practice anyway, so he liked to show up early and watch Kuroko and Kagami on the court.

If Momoi texted him he could always tell her he was gathering information on their opponents. It’s not like he wasn’t, after all.

He waited on the sidelines, watching Kuroko chat with Riko. Their three-point guy and Kiyoshi Ironheart were arguing on the sidelines, and Kuroko was listening to Riko with a little half-smile. He nodded, and then went over to join the other two. Riko looked after him for a minute, and then looked around with a little frown. She caught sight of Aomine and raised an eyebrow.

He raised a hand in an awkward wave.

She trotted over to him. “Aomine-kun,” she greeted, adjusting her glasses. “Where’s your boyfriend?”

Aomine scowled at her. “What’re you talking about? You were just talking to him.” Even with Kuroko’s misdirection, she was his coach, she should be able to keep track of him better than that.

Riko blinked, and then flapped a hand. “Oh, no, I meant Kagami.”

Aomine stared at her. “Kagami’s not my boyfriend.”

“Oh,” said Riko, and then frowned. “I thought you guys were—y’know, I thought you were like us.”

“Like you,” Aomine said slowly.

“Kuroko hasn’t told you?” Riko asked, sounding surprised. “But it was his advice that made it happen in the first place. We’re all dating, Junpei and Teppei and I.” She cocked her head. “So you and Kuroko, and obviously Kuroko and Kagami, but not the two of you?”

Aomine licked his lips, a little pissed that Kagami got an _obviously_ but he didn’t. “No,” he said. “Not us.”

Riko looked past him and raised her eyebrows; Aomine scowled at her, but stopped when a warm weight settled on his shoulders and Kagami said, “Yo, idiot,” in his ear.

“What,” he said flatly. He wanted to shove Kagami off, but halfway into doing so realized he was only doing it for Riko’s sake and stopped himself. This was stupid.

“Kuroko wants to go to the record store later,” Kagami said. “You in?”

“Sure,” Aomine said, not looking at Riko’s face. 

Kagami gave a satisfied hum and removed his arm. “Seeya, coach,” he said, and wandered away.

Riko watched him go. “Not you two,” she said quietly. “Does he know that?”

Aomine glared at her. She smirked, undaunted, and then jogged after Kagami.

It—wasn’t weird, how much Kagami touched him. It _wasn’t_ , it was just how he was, and it certainly didn’t mean anything. They were just—like that, the three of them. He and Kagami were both extremely physical people—and most of the time they touched it wasn’t exactly affectionate, they were always punching each other and wrestling and smacking each other around, casual, violent one-upmanship.

So when Kagami slipped an arm around his waist as they left the record store, hooking his thumb through his belt loop, he tried not to think about what Riko would have said. Kuroko, on Kagami’s other side, had folded their fingers together ages ago. _That_ was dating. That was _obvious_.

“I thought that old cashier was going to set me on fire with her eyes when I kissed you on the cheek, Kagami-kun,” Kuroko said, half annoyed, half amused. He pulled his face into an imitation of her glare and Aomine laughed at him. He felt good; he felt right. Nothing was weird.

Kuroko turned to look ahead of them and his face shifted—surprise flickering over his features, then a sort of wariness. Aomine followed his gaze.

“I thought she was just glaring because she thought you were going to shoplift something,” Kagami started, but Aomine ignored him.

Kise was walking down the street towards them. Aomine caught the end of some darker expression on his face before he started to smile, bright and carefree. “Kurokocchi, Aominecchi,” he greeted, “would you mind if I borrowed Kagamicchi for a minute?”

Kagami blinked at him. “Oh,” he said, “hey, Kise.” He dropped the hand from Aomine’s waist, and Aomine felt suddenly cold at the loss. He started to scowl, but Kise was watching him and he schooled the expression into something more neutral.

Kise smiled at him and gave Kagami a little wave before looking back at Kuroko, who was regarding him with his head on one side.

“Can’t borrow what isn’t mine,” Aomine said. It came out too abrupt, but somehow Kise’s gaze was worse than Riko’s, and. And he still didn’t quite know how to be around him, how to think about him since that night at Momoi’s. He slipped a few steps away from where he’d been close at Kagami’s side. “Kuroko, you wanna get a shake?”

“Yeah,” said Kuroko. He looked at Kise for another long moment, and then crossed to join Aomine.

Aomine reached down and took his hand, leading him away towards the corner. He glanced at him out of the corner of his eye; Kuroko was watching him, his face unreadable. “Did you know?” he asked, before he could think better of it. “That he’s in love with me.”

Kuroko’s hand tightened briefly on his. “Who?”

Aomine frowned at him. “What do you mean, who?” he demanded. “Kise, obviously.”

“Oh,” said Kuroko, his eyes going sadder. He sighed. “Yeah,” he admitted. “For—for a long time.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Aomine asked. His voice came out plaintive. 

“Wasn’t mine to tell,” Kuroko said, maybe a little guiltily. “He—he told you, that night you talked?”

Aomine nodded.

Kuroko stopped, pulling Aomine to a halt, too. “And?” he asked, softly, staring up at him, dramatic in the well of the streetlight.

Aomine bit his lip. “I didn’t really respond,” he said. “I guess I don’t really—know _how_ to respond.”

Kuroko bit his lip in echoed anxiety. “You—you came back to me,” he said, “that’s. A kind of response.”

Aomine ran a hand up his throat and into his hair. “Yeah,” he said. “And it was the right one,” because it had been, because that much was certain. It was just everything else that wasn’t.

Kuroko took a step forward to bury his head in Aomine’s chest, wrapping his arms around him and hugging him hard. “Good,” he said, fierce and pleased, and Aomine pressed a kiss into his hair.

Kuroko pulled back. “The convenience store’s closed,” he remarked.

Aomine blinked at him, and then at the darkened windows of the store. “Damn.” He looked around. “There’s a candy stand,” he said. “You want something from that?”

Kuroko nodded, but his eyes were back on Kise and Kagami, standing toe-to-toe on the other side of the street. “Yeah,” he said. “Hold on for a sec, okay?”

“Sure,” said Aomine, and then Kuroko was gone. Aomine blinked, and then found him standing with the others, having ghosted across the street in the blink of an eye.

He tried not to think about what they were saying. The candy vendor was charging ridiculous prices; he busied himself with talking her down to something more reasonable. When next he glanced at the group Kise was watching him, golden gaze unreadable. Aomine quirked his eyebrows at him and Kise looked away.

Aomine relented and bought the candy. By the time he got back to his—to Kuroko and Kagami, Kise was gone.

“You should probably say something sometime, Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said casually, as if Kagami wasn’t there, as if there was no reason Aomine would have a problem with continuing to talk about this in front of him.

Aomine handed him a vanilla lollipop and passed Kagami strawberry pocky. Kagami took it with a grunt of thanks. “Say something to who?” he asked.

Aomine glared at Kuroko, who said blithely, “Kise-kun is in love with Aomine-kun.”

Kagami, in the process of removing a piece of his pocky from the box, snapped it in half. He fumbled, dropped half on the ground, and shoved the other half in his mouth. “Oh,” he said around it. “Huh.”

“Huh,” Aomine echoed mockingly. “Very wise, idiot.” He sighed. If they were gonna talk about it, they might as well actually talk about it. “What would I even say, though?” he asked, staring upward at the narrow strip of night sky, visible between the buildings. “Hey, Kise, I’ve never really thought about it outside of wanting to fuck you, but maybe we should try and date sometime even though I’m already dating someone else and _he’s_ dating someone _else_?”

“Kuroko’s got two boyfriends,” Kagami said, munching. “Doesn’t seem fair for you not to as well.”

Aomine looked sideways at him, knocked the back of his knee with his own. “You’d have to get another one too,” he pointed out. “Really make it even.”

Kagami’s gaze slid over his face and away. “Yeah,” he said. “S’true.”

Beyond him, Kuroko was silent, his lips closed tight around his lollipop. Aomine watched him as he walked. “Tetsu.”

Kuroko raised an eyebrow at him. Aomine licked his lips. “I don’t have to say anything at all. We can just leave it.”

Kuroko tucked the lollipop into his cheek. “So every time we see Kise-kun you can avoid his eyes and he can get all miserable and jealous?” He shook his head. “I didn’t think you were so cruel, Aomine-kun. These things need to be talked about.”

Kise’s voice whispered in his ear: _You are neither this stupid nor this cruel, Aominecchi_. He was, though; probably both. He’d put Kise in the same category as Momoi for so long that it had never occurred to him that Kise might _love_ him. And now—did he have to figure out a way to reject him kindly? Should he reject him at all?

“Your first thought was to try it out,” Kuroko said softly. “In your hypothetical. I think that matters.”

Aomine stole a piece of pocky from Kagami’s box, biting the tip off thoughtfully. “Yeah.”

The more he thought about it, the more he felt like—why shouldn’t he have another boyfriend? He and Kise were friends, and he was hot as hell, and he’d grown up a lot since middle school – every time he saw him he was in a new mode, somewhere between his old capable and hot, his spikes of personality smoothing into a much more consistent, kind of incredible person. Aomine would love to hang out with him more, and it would give him something to focus on when he was slipping into self-pity—Kise wouldn’t tolerate that shit.

“Yeah,” he said again. “I—I’m gonna talk to him.”

Kagami grabbed his hand, biting the rest of the pocky stick off and leaving Aomine with the unflavored end. “But first you’re gonna beat him at basketball,” he said with his mouth full, “right?”

Aomine rolled his eyes at him. “Obviously,” he said, and Kagami grinned, sliding an arm back around his waist where it belonged.

+

The game against Kaijo, if anything, just made him more determined to talk to Kise. His friend played _incredibly_ well, the best Aomine had ever seen him, and there was an actual moment where he thought he might lose. It was no longer than a breath, but it slid into Aomine’s heart like—like a seed, ready to sprout with the right attention, the right circumstance.

It also made his victory worse than any other he’d ever had, his disappointment in Kise sharper than anything he’d ever felt, and he knew it was unfair but he couldn’t do anything but leave him there, collapsed on the court—hoped he would know it for the mark of respect it was, mixed in with the frustration; respect because Kise would pick himself up, would always pick himself up, Aomine needed him to pick himself up if this seed was ever going to grow.

His stupid overbearing captain didn’t let him pick himself up, though, and that pissed Aomine off enough that when he heard the snapped, “What the fuck is wrong with you?” from behind him he was ready for a fight.

He turned, raising an eyebrow at Kasamatsu. “Considering I just beat you guys, I’m gonna go with ‘nothing’.”  
Kasamatsu stared at him in disbelief. “You can’t fucking treat him this way,” he said, closing the distance between them, going toe-to-toe. “You can’t do this to him and honestly pretend you’re friends.”

Aomine narrowed his eyes. There was something there—a strain of protectiveness that was more than a captain might have for his ace, a personal stake. He decided to poke at it and see what happened. “Oh, I see,” he said slowly. “This is about Kise, huh.”

Kasamatsu glared at him. “Of course it is.”

Aomine scratched his jaw, mocking. “Of course it is.”

Kasamatsu tensed, the little barb hitting home. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean—“

"You know,” Aomine cut in, because what the fuck did this asshole know about him and Kise? Who the fuck was he, to try and tell Aomine they weren’t friends? “It’s cute that you think you know him better than I do. Adorable, really.” He shifted his stance, making himself larger, more intimidating. “I’ve known Kise a long time, and I can tell you this much: he doesn’t need a fucking nursemaid. If he’s got a problem with me, he can take it up with me himself.”

“I don’t care how long you’ve known him,” Kasamatsu snapped, “and I definitely don’t care what you think he needs.”

“Kise doesn’t need shit from me,” Aomine said, glaring. Why the hell wasn’t this guy backing down? “Trust me. He’s fine. It was a good game.”

“Yeah,” Kasamatsu shot back. “It was an incredible game, and you’re a fucking asshole.”

“What,” Aomine drawled, “I should’ve helped him up? Why? He can stand on his own—or if he can’t, he’s got you.” He’d been fighting with Kagami for weeks, this little weirdo didn’t stand a chance. He smirked a little and drove it home: “You think I should feel bad for the guy just because he’s in love with me? He still lost.”

Kasamatsu’s face convulsed. “You know?” he snapped, and, hey, woah, that wasn’t right. “You know, and you still fucking—flaunt it, rub your shit with Kuroko in his face?”

That—that wasn’t _right_ , he was supposed to be surprised that his darling Kise had his sights set elsewhere, not already know, not be surprised that Aomine knew. And he’d crossed another line—scored another point, brought Kuroko into this. Totally fucking unnecessary.

Aomine felt suddenly sobered, was no longer having any fun. “Look,” he said. “I get it, you care about the guy. So do I. But me and Kuroko and Kagami, that’s just something he’s gotta get used to. He knows that, so I suggest you wise the fuck up.”

Kasamatsu clenched his fists at his sides. “You’re not even going to fucking apologize—“

“Why would I?” Aomine tucked his hands in his pockets. “I didn’t do shit. Pass on my compliments, unless it’ll make your head explode.” He turned away, waving a hand in goodbye, and left Kasamatsu there, frowning at the ground.

Aomine frowned, too, as he made his way to the train. Kasamatsu had been surprised Aomine knew, which implied that when they talked about it—Kise had _talked to him about it,_ that was fucked up enough—when they talked about it, Aomine _hadn’t_ known. Which meant Kise had told his fucking nursemaid captain that he was in love with Aomine before he’d told Aomine himself.

In what world was that fair?

He pulled out his phone, tapped out a vengeful _you looked pretty good out there until I won_ , and shoved it back into his pocket.

+

Aomine slid Kuroko’s key into the lock, pushed the door open. “Kagami,” he called. “It’s Aomine, Tetsu sent me with his keys to get some shit he left here.”

Kagami’s apartment was clean and silent, and Aomine felt—weird, being here when Kagami didn’t know he was. He crossed immediately to the bedroom and slid open the door.

He’d never actually been in here before—Kagami had started letting Kuroko and Aomine have sex on his couch if they were staying here, but his bed was, totally fairly, an out-of-bounds zone. Aomine looked curiously around, taking in the sparse decoration, the hair care products on the dresser, the punching bag hanging in one corner, and froze.

There was a form in Kagami’s bed—a sheet draped over curves, and Aomine stared at it, disbelieving. There was no fucking way—

The shape shifted, yawned, and turned over; a beautiful, blond, very naked woman blinked sleepy blue eyes at him. “Oh,” she said. “Hi.”

“What,” said Aomine, “the _fuck_.”

“Alex,” called Kagami from the front hall, “did you leave the door—” he stepped through and caught sight of Aomine, “—open…”

He stared at Aomine. Aomine stared back, rage and disbelief rising to choke him. Before he could think about what he was doing he was launching himself forward, swinging his fist hard at Kagami’s head.

Kagami’s eyes widened and he dodged just too late, Aomine’s knuckles clipping him on the ear. He shook himself, raising his hands in time to deflect Aomine’s next punch. “Stop,” he growled, “Aomine—fucking— _stop_ , this isn’t what it looks like—”

“Really?” Aomine snarled. “Really, you son of a bitch?” He swung a leg to try and trip him but Kagami was faster, dodging backward, not trying to defend himself at all. “Because it looks like you’re a fucking _straight boy_ who’s been lying to Tetsu—to me—”

A bare leg swept his from behind, and he went down hard. Blinking stars from his eyes, he looked up in time for the woman—still naked—to place her foot casually against his throat, pressing down just enough to make him feel a little nauseous, a little trapped. “You’ve got it really, super wrong, kid,” she said in accented Japanese, and then she smiled at him. “S’up? I’m Alex.”

He glared at her. “Aomine.”

Alex moved her foot, and Kagami held out a hand to help Aomine up. Aomine smacked it out of the way. “You know, I was just starting to buy it?” He growled. “The whole no sex thing, Satsuki’s bullshit about subjective truth—”

“Aomine,” Kagami said, rolling his eyes.

“No,” said Aomine. “You don’t get to talk your way out of this—”

“Aomine,” Kagami snapped. “You think if I was cheating on Kuroko I’d be this fucking calm about being found out? You think I would cheat on Kuroko in an apartment he basically lives in, an apartment that he has his own key to?”

Aomine forced himself to calm down, to actually think about that. For all Aomine insulted him, Kagami wasn’t stupid—not in practical shit, not _this_ kind of stupid. And the woman—Alex—hadn’t seemed surprised at anything he was saying, or panicked at all, and.

And once he was thinking about it, he knew; it was written in every glance Kagami cast Kuroko’s way, in every little touch they passed between them, in every word and half-word and wordless glance. Kagami would never, ever hurt him. Not like this.

Aomine licked his lips and met Kagami’s eyes. Kagami stared him down, steady, honest, _open_ , and when he held out a hand again, Aomine took it. He let Kagami pull him to his feet and halfway into his arms, let Kagami smack him upside the head before releasing him. “Idiot,” he said quietly. “Think first, next time.”

His cheek was red from Aomine’s fist and Aomine reached out to run a thumb lightly over it, grimacing. “Sorry,” he said, meaning—for the punch and for the whole thing, for. Leaping to conclusions, even if they were conclusions any reasonable person would leap to under the circumstances.

“S’okay,” Kagami said, smirking at him. “You were just thinking about what it would mean if _you_ had a hot naked girl in your bed.”

Aomine had a sudden, overwhelming urge to slip his hand downward, slide his thumb across the width of that smirk, just to see what would happen. He dropped his hand, instead, turned to look at Alex. “Hi,” he said. “Maybe we should try this whole introduction thing again.”

She raised blond brows at him. “Maybe we should,” she said, and stepped forward, taking his face in her hands and kissing him.

Aomine froze. Before he could figure out how the hell to even react, she was pulling away, regarding him with her head cocked. “Alexandra Garcia,” she said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Aomine Daiki,” said Aomine, dazed, and then shook himself. There was something about that name—”Hang on,” he said, “Alexandra Garcia, like, the WNBA player?”

Alex grinned at him. “Want an autograph?”

“Put some clothes on,” Kagami grumbled, “and let poor Aomine get his bearings, would you?” He looped a hand around Aomine’s wrist and tugged him into the kitchen. “She’s my coach, from America.”

“Your coach,” Aomine said slowly, ignoring his urge to twist his wrist—so he could pull away, so they’d be holding hands. “You were _coached_ by a WNBA player?”

“Former, technically,” Kagami said, releasing him, “but yeah. You want something to drink?”

Aomine nodded, and Kagami got him a glass of water, passing it to him across the table. “But she’s not,” Aomine started, and then grimaced and gestured around his neck.

Kagami raised his eyebrows at him.

Aomine coughed. “Your, um. Your ring,” he said. “Tetsu told me it’s from someone you used to know, someone you. Loved.”

Kagami turned away, pouring himself a glass, too. “Yeah,” he said.

“No,” said Alex, “it’s not me.” She came in, took a seat at Aomine’s side, and propped her chin on her hands. “Have you seen him, Taiga? He’s here too, right?”

Kagami flushed, not looking at Aomine as he sat across from them. “Yeah,” he said. “A—a little. I almost got to play him, but we got interrupted.”

Aomine raised his eyebrows. “He?”

Kagami finally met his eyes. “Very much not a straight boy,” he said, his voice dark with irony.

Aomine’s lip curled up, but he didn’t really feel amused. “If he’s here—it could be like Kise and me, if. You could talk to him—”

Kagami shook his head. “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t feel the same way,” he said quietly. “And anyway, I don’t really feel like I need to, you know?” He held Aomine’s eyes, his gaze complicated. “Someone else plays his role in my life now.”

Aomine nodded. “Probably better than he did, if he didn’t return your feelings,” he said, and Kagami stared at him, his eyes weirdly wide. “Since you can be so sure of Tetsu’s, I mean.”

Kagami swallowed and dropped his gaze. “Yeah,” he said, a little awkwardly, and Aomine frowned at him. What—

“Hang on,” Alex cut in, “if you’re Aomine, I think you’re part of the reason I’m here.”

Aomine turned to look at her, surprised. “What do you mean?”

“Alex,” said Kagami warningly.

“Oh, nothing,” Alex said, her eyes shifting wicked. “Taiga’s just going to kick your ass, that’s all.”

Aomine snorted, and turned to Kagami, who seemed to have gotten over his weirdness, his face settling into its normal challenging half-smirk. There was something in it, though, that made Aomine’s breath catch in his chest. “Is that so?” he asked.

“Damn right,” said Kagami easily.

Aomine cracked his neck. “Bring it,” he said, “the _fuck_ on.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let's see - we've got a couple scenes from the end of [A Liar and a Lover](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3215942) in this chapter, as well as one from [A Brother in Arms](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3306077) and another which is actually in both [Love Is A Changer](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3384527) and [Breathe You In](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3445022/chapters/7553987), making it the scene we see from the most perspectives (Aomine, Kasamatsu, and Midorima). I think that makes this chapter the one with the most connections to other fics, as well!
> 
> One more chapter for poor suffering Aomine - boy just has too many feelings for his own good.


	4. Chapter 4

Aomine was lying on Kuroko’s couch, so fully exhausted that he basically never wanted to move again. He’d stopped skipping practice. He and Kuroko and Kagami would meet again on the court soon, and there was no way he was going to let himself be anything but fully prepared. 

Momoi knew—Momoi worked him harder than she had in years, running drills, forcing him to improve his coordination with the rest of the team, keeping him on for extra practice just with her, where she stabbed her knife-sharp fingers into his muscles wherever he might be a centimeter off where he should be.

He and Kagami had stopped playing street ball, to keep some of their newest tricks to themselves. It make Aomine itch.

He stared at his phone because the other option was staring at the book balanced on his chest and there was no way he was gonna do _that_ , and somehow he went from reading sports news to looking at hot celebs to scrolling through pictures of extremely stupid-looking dogs (a lot of hot celebs owned really stupid dogs, turned out). He snorted, screencapped one, and sent it to Kagami with the caption _look it’s you._

He could’ve walked three steps to where Kagami sat sprawled just as tired and lazy as he was, but. Again, that would have meant moving.

He slid his eyes sideways and watched as Kagami sighed, running one of his huge hands up into his hair. He was frowning a little, frustrated with whatever he was working on, and Aomine grinned when he leaned back to fish his phone out of his pocket and check it. He blinked, and then snorted, his eyes flicking to Aomine warmly for a minute before he focused back on his phone.

Aomine turned back to his own, weirdly disappointed. He’d wanted him to be freaked out by it—idiot was supposed to be afraid of dogs, right—or at least get pissed off. But Kagami just kept his eyes on his phone, smirking a little, maybe at something else—Aomine looked at Kuroko, maybe he’d also sent him something, only to find Kuroko looking right back, eyebrows raised. 

He was sitting on the floor, his back brushing against the leg Aomine had left hanging off the couch, his feet stretched out to tuck his toes under Kagami’s thigh, and Aomine loved when they sat like this—when Kuroko was a bridge, between them. It was obviously better than when Kuroko just sat with Kagami, and he’d started feeling—weird and guilty, whenever he and Kuroko just curled up by themselves, didn’t like thinking about Kagami maybe. Resenting him, or something.

So this was best, and comfortable—all of them sprawled wide to let off enough body heat, which was good when they were coming down from practice, but still—strung together on a string, still connected, still. He scowled at Kuroko and shook his head, because what was that look even supposed to mean, and then his phone lit up on his chest.

He picked it up. Kagami had sent him a picture back, a sleek, powerful hunting dog, dark and masculine and graceful, with the caption, _this one’s you._

Aomine stared at it. “What the fuck,” he said aloud.

Kagami glared at him. “What,” he said defensively.

“I sent you that stupid-looking piece of shit animal and you send me this?” he waved the phone. “What the hell, idiot.”

Kagami flushed and glared harder. “That dog looked really cute and happy! I was trying to repay the compliment!”

Aomine sat up a little. “I wasn’t _complimenting_ you,” he said disbelievingly, “I was trying to insult you, oh my god—“

“Why would you insult me by sending me a picture of a dog? If you want to insult me just do it with your mouth, you do all the time anyway—“

“If I wanted to compliment you I could do that with my mouth, too,” Aomine snapped.

Kagami raised his eyebrows at him. Kuroko muttered, “Aomine-kun, oh my god,” half-laughing, half-warning, as if. As if Aomine needed the reminder.

“Could you?” Kagami said, eyes flashing, and if he were _anyone else_ Aomine would have been on his feet and crossing to him in a fucking second, exhaustion or no, would have showed him exactly how good he thought Kagami looked, like, all the fucking time, would have appreciated his muscle and his smile and his broad-palmed hands with his teeth and tongue but—but Kagami didn’t want that from him. Kagami _didn’t want_ him, and the challenge in his voice and his face and the set of his jaw was an entirely different one, one that Aomine had no idea how to face.

“Yes,” he snapped. “There’s just nothing about you I like.”

Kuroko pinched him for being mean but Aomine ignored him, his eyes on Kagami’s face. For a minute he thought Kagami wouldn’t give him the out—he saw Kagami consider not giving him the out—but then his weird, waiting stare relaxed into an annoyed glare and he snapped, “S’mutual,” and went back to looking at his phone.

Three minutes later Aomine got another text with a different dog, this one a tiny Chihuahua wearing a pink bow, its eyes going in different directions. _sorry,_ said the text, _attached wrong pic b4_

Aomine threw his textbook at Kagami’s head and tried not to feel like a coward.

If only Kise would answer his _fucking_ texts.

+

Aomine pushed his hands through his hair, ran his fingers over his face. Around him, his teammates were all going through their pre-game rituals, grounding themselves, preparing. Years ago, Aomine had had one of his own—a routine, food he would eat, a certain order he would stretch his muscles in. A small obeisance he’d pay to the gods of sport, before he toppled their tower and stood in its ruins, took a place on their pedestal for himself.

Right now, he felt them whisper around his shoulders, found himself trying to remember—arms and back first, and then legs, but which arm first—

Momoi broke away from her conversation with Wakamatsu, crossing to him where he sat on the bench. “Dai-chan,” she asked curiously, “are you nervous?”

Aomine scowled at her. “No,” he said, because he wasn’t, nervous wasn’t the right word for what he was. He wasn’t sure there _was_ a right word for what he was. Was there a word for being set 100% against yourself, for being completely hopeful that something will happen at the same time that you’re totally committed to making sure it doesn’t?

Winning today would—hurt, a lot. Winning today would preserve the hopeless loneliness that had settled in to the back of his head the first time his teammates looked at him with fear in their eyes, the loneliness that still rose to choke him on his darkest nights. Winning today would mean he was still—trapped, desperately seeking, unsatisfied, incomplete.

But losing—losing would mean he lost his edge over everyone—over Kagami—an edge that had become increasingly important to him since they started their weird trio relationship. Being better than Kagami at basketball, having Kuroko _know_ that he was better than Kagami at basketball, meant that in some sense he was still higher, in Kuroko’s eyes, even if it was in such a small way. Even if Kagami—open, communicative, loving Kagami—was a better boyfriend in every other way, Aomine was still a better player, and he knew that on some level his skill was why Kuroko loved him at all. 

The idea of losing that was horrible, terrifying—almost as terrifying as the idea of _having lost_ was amazing. If Aomine had lost—just once, that’s all he needed—it would be an affirmation that there was someone like him, that he really wasn’t alone. That he wasn’t a freak, a monster, that he was just a human dedicated to reaching his full potential and he was not the only one.

Aomine had run out of hands long ago in this debate, but eventually, when he stripped down all his giant frustrating confusions, he came to one conclusion, the simplest version of the truth:

Winning was winning. Losing was losing. And in his deepest, most primal self, Aomine Daiki fucking hated to lose.

He took the court, his team at his heels, and watched Kagami and Kuroko tap fists, smile at each other. Neither of them turned to look at Aomine. No smile for him, no wink, no wave.

Good. That made this easier.

At first it was just like a higher-octane version of their first game—Seirin’s web tighter, its center now the pillared strength of Kiyoshi Ironheart, every member playing to the best of their ability with no sense of entitlement, no sense of domination. And then—

Aomine would laugh about it, later; would pull Kuroko to his side and say against his temple, _you know, you’d think I’d have learned by now not to underestimate you_. But here, on the court, he couldn’t do anything but stare. He’d had an idea of Kagami’s growing strength—had been setting himself against it, in its diminished form, after all, in their games of streetball. But Kuroko’s new strength—his new drive, his new shot—blindsided him. Suddenly, Kuroko on the court wasn’t something he was used to.

It shifted the floor under him—forced him deeper into himself, and between that and the general ridiculous competence of the rest of Seirin he was feeling—weightless and weighted all at once, balanced above the thoughtless, instinctive drop that was the Zone.

He glanced at Momoi—saw her eyes flick rapidly between him and Kagami and Kuroko and Kiyoshi, slip sideways to Riko where she stood in mirrored, narrow-eyed observation—and then she gave him the absolute tiniest of nods.

It was a good thing she did, because Kagami’s presence in front of him was impossible to ignore, and with him defending Aomine would have dropped, anyway, unable—and the word sang in him, how long had it been since he had been _unable_ when his feet were on this floor—to beat him, otherwise, unable to shake him. 

Once he was in the Zone everything faded and sharpened at once. The first time he’d done this it had been almost like blacking out—when he shook it off it took him a long time to remember his actions at all, because there was no chain of command to retrace—no movement from observation to plan of action to action itself, just a furious eyeblink of pure unthinking motion.

But he’d honed it, figured out how to control it, and now it just—gave him a little bit extra time, shifted him slightly out of the normal rate of seconds and minutes and into something else. Gave him space to breathe, away from the blazing, incredible heat of Kagami’s presence.

They pulled ahead, and Aomine felt the sick, satisfying knowledge that he was safe—he would win.

He shifted, slightly, on his feet, the basketball light in his hand. He could see its arc in his head—perfect, implacable, almost automatic, and he set it on its course with a practiced flip of his wrist.

Kagami slammed it out of the air, landing hard, his chest heaving and his eyes blazing and his movements _matching Aomine’s_. Hyuuga caught the ball and drove to the other side and Aomine was in front of him, quick as thought—nearly smashing into Kagami’s chest as he ran.

Aomine took a breath. The rest of the team was still moving at normal pace, but Kagami—Kagami was here, in this weird sideslipped space, in the Zone with him. He burned with a kind of red-hot light that made Aomine want to look away, but he couldn’t tear his eyes off him, he. Later, later he would wonder if this is how Kuroko saw _him_ , later he would wonder if this is how it had felt, to—but—now—

Kagami spun, his eyes shifting over Aomine’s face without seeing him, and then suddenly he had the ball. He moved, Aomine moved—his body reacting to Kagami’s body almost without the input of his eyes because his eyes were too filled with _light_. It was like there was something intangible ricocheting off of each of them, driving them to move faster, pushing them higher or lower or further outside, wherever the Zone was in relation to reality, like a climb to some summit and a whirling, jolting freefall all at once. Aomine’s world narrowed to himself, the ball, the net—and always Kagami, always there, eyes locked with his the way birds lock talons, in flight, in sex, in death.

It was the most intense physical intimacy Aomine had ever experienced in his life, and they never even touched.

The swish of Kagami’s last shot through the net—breaking their constant, locked tie—released him, and Aomine felt shaky-legged, exhausted, and completely, impossibly free.

He watched Seirin swarm Kagami, watch him shift, slip back into being just Kagami again. Watched him do what Aomine had never been able to, watched him turn it off. Kuroko leaned up to kiss his cheek, daring in his total joy, and Kagami wrapped an arm around his back and raised his eyes to Aomine’s. 

Aomine looked back, steady-eyed, and smiled.

“I’ll win next time,” Kagami said to the reporters. His team laughed, because hell, he’d won this time, but Aomine heard—Aomine nodded, relief taking away the last of the darkness in his mind, relief that Kagami wasn’t done. With this, with him.

“I’ll win next time,” Aomine said.

An echoed promise, half-spoken, like everything else between them.

+

He woke up sweating—his whole body aching, from playing too hard and with arousal both. Little snippets of his dream clung to the inside of his skull—big, competent hands, blazing eyes, wolfish grins—and he very carefully didn’t put them together, didn’t let them form a whole.

He ran a hand over his face and grabbed his phone. _kise_

He waited; he turned over; he tried to go back to sleep.

_kise_

His phone light hurt his eyes but the darkness was worse, his dreams waiting for him, and it—he. He knew it would only make it worse. He knew.

He shoved his pillow over his head and breathed and breathed and breathed, flipped over onto his stomach.

_kise i swear to god_

Fucking—fine, if he wasn’t going to answer he’d have to just—pretend he had. He raked his nails down his own stomach, angry in a somehow new way. Everything was a little bit new, because there was an emptiness at the back of his skull where hopelessness should have been, a little calm, determined pocket he could slip into now, and that was amazing, but it was like. It. Every time he touched it, embodied it, let himself fully realize it, his heart went crazy in his chest, because it was a new feeling _gifted_ to him and it still bore the gifter’s mark, like a stolen shirt that hadn’t lost its original scent.

He slipped out of it again, into anger, because it was easier, ground down into sheets and his own fist, filled his longing, traitorous mouth with the choking softness of his pillow, and thought as hard as he could about Kise. About the long, perfect column of his throat. About the nude he’d sent him, so long ago—what he would look like now, his muscles more cut, his face sharper, his eyes more knowing. Aomine imagined a thousand little things and none of them fully, skimming across the top of fantasy and orgasm both, his muscles trembling with frustration.

He gave up. He pushed himself to his feet, sent Kise a last text— _you better be dead in a ditch somewhere or answer your goddamn texts_ —and forced his screaming muscles to go for a run.

He made it down the block before he stopped, panting, slipping his phone from his pocket and dialing. 

“Tetsu,” he said, breathless, before Kuroko could say anything.. “I—I know it’s late and I’m sorry but I need to just—talk this out.”

“It’s okay, Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said, sounding sleep, comfortable, happy. “I wanted to talk to you anyway, see how you were.”

Aomine stared at the street. “Yeah,” he said.

“So,” said Kuroko, and then, a little tentatively, “you lost.”

“I lost,” Aomine acknowledged, “I—” he closed his eyes. “I really think. I need to talk to Kise.”

Kuroko was silent for a minute. “Oh,” he said in a different voice. “That’s—not really what I was expecting.”

“I just think,” said Aomine, and then stopped. “Sorry. Fuck.”

“Aomine-kun,” Kuroko said slowly, “I thought—I thought it was a good thing. For you, I mean, I thought—” 

He sounded upset, and Aomine pressed a hand to his temple, wanted to punch something. “It was,” he insisted, “I—it was amazing, it was the best game I’ve ever played, Kagami was—” he stopped.

Kuroko took a breath, but didn’t say anything.

“So,” said Aomine miserably, “I need to talk to Kise, so I can. I think he could help me.”

“Help you with what?” Kuroko asked, sounding frustrated. “Aomine-kun, what’s going on with you—” 

There was a sound of a bed creaking, and Kagami said, “Is that Aomine? What’s wrong?”

Aomine swallowed hard. “He’s—you’re there with him?”

“Yeah,” said Kuroko, as if it was obvious, and it probably should have been, they’d just won, of course they wouldn’t split up after a victory like that. He knew they slept together, just slept, had seen them, curled naked and unguarded and impossibly comfortable in each others’ arms.

Jealousy—new, like everything else, differently directed, _doubled_ jealousy—slipped up his throat and out his mouth. “Tell him it’s none of his fucking business.”

There was a startled moment of silence, and then Kuroko must have pulled the phone from his ear because Aomine could hear him saying something to Kagami in a low tone, and Kagami saying something back. “He wants to know if you want to play street ball tomorrow,” Kuroko said at last.

Aomine—didn’t. The idea of meeting Kagami on the court again so soon made him want to fall apart at the seams, but he couldn’t say no. Not only would that be a giant blinking sign to both of them, but it would be a blow to that fragile, smiling promise they’d made after their game, would make Kagami doubt, and he couldn’t. Do that.

“Fine,” he said shortly.

“Good,” said Kuroko, sounding satisfied.

Aomine licked his lips. He wanted to say more, wanted to know how to say more. He heard Kagami murmur something, and then Kuroko said, “it’s too bad you’ve missed the last train, Aomine-kun.”

Aomine let out a little bitter breath. “Why, you offering me consolation blowjobs?”

Kuroko laughed a little. “I could be,” he said, “but I was thinking more you could sleep with us. If. You can’t sleep there.”

Aomine curled into himself, letting his eyes slip closed, his chest tight with something he couldn’t name. “Goodnight, Tetsu.”

+

The next day dawned bright and clear, and as Aomine jogged over to the streetball court he couldn’t help but remember the first time he’d seen Kagami, injured and limping, the insane brightness of his being slumbering in his chest. He slowed as he got closer, wanting to see him now without being seen, himself.

Kagami was sitting on the bench by the court, his face turned up to the sun, his eyes closed.

Aomine trotted up to him and kicked him in the ankle. “Oi,” he said. “You drag me out here and then you don’t even warm up for it?”

Kagami opened one warm eye. “I’m not playing,” he said, and closed it again.

Aomine scowled at him. “What the fuck?”

Kagami stretched both arms upward, yawned, and draped them over the back of the bench. “Way too tired,” he said.

“So why invite me?” Aomine asked, baffled, running a hand through his hair.

“I’m a distraction,” Kagami said simply. “Kuroko’s going to ask Kise to stop ignoring you right now, so I’m here to stop you storming off after him.”

Aomine blinked. “He’s what?”

“Momoi too,” Kagami said. “Sun’s nice. Siddown.”

Aomine hovered for a minute. “But—”

Kagami reached out and tugged him forward by the wrist until Aomine sat next to him, and then immediately turned his face upward and closed his eyes again. “She asked us to win.”

Aomine looked sideways at him and then—couldn’t really stop looking; he was smiling a little bit, the sun picking gold threads out in his hair and his eyebrows both. “What?” he asked, a little bit belated.

“Momoi,” Kagami supplied. “Before our first game, she asked Kuroko and me to beat you at basketball.”

“Oh,” said Aomine, disgruntled. “I feel like I should be mad about that.”

Kagami’s smile grew. “Should be, but aren’t?”

“Mm,” said Aomine. He tore his eyes off Kagami’s face, staring at his knees. “I’m glad someone is keeping their promises to her.”

Kagami opened his eyes specifically to roll them at him. “Cut the self-pity.”

Aomine flipped him idly off, and they fell into a strange kind of silence. The sunlight sank into the skin of Aomine’s shoulders and he felt extremely comfortable and extremely tense at once, Kagami solid and impossible to ignore at his side.

“I,” he said after a long time of watching the wind shift in the trees, watching buses slide by. “I should thank you.” He swallowed. “For—being cool with me?”

Kagami just waited, eyes closed.

Aomine blew out a breath. “If you’d been as jealous as I was,” he said, “you really could have made shit hard for me, and I appreciate that you. You know, didn’t, weren’t.” He took a breath. “You—just. Thanks, I guess.”

Kagami was still silent, his head a little cocked.

Aomine stared sideways at him. “Kagami?”

Kagami slumped toward him, his head hitting Aomine’s shoulder, and he let out a breath that was halfway to a snore.

Aomine clenched his jaw. “You fuckin’ asshole,” he said, but softly; softly, he did not move. 

He stared up at the sky, Kagami breathing warm against his throat, and wondered what the hell they were saying to Kise.

+

Aomine's second year at Teiko was formed primarily around Kise. He was the first dude Aomine had ever found attractive; he’d shown up to practice one day out of the blue, stepped onto the court and accepted Aomine’s challenge, and Aomine had thought _whoa, this guy’s pretty._ That first impression never went away, as Kise went from being terrible at basketball to kind of breathtaking.

So when he showed up again, about six months later, with his lip split and a crescent moon of a bruise curled around one eye, Aomine took it kind of personally.

He stared at Haizaki Shogo, waiting outside the gym, his hands in his pockets, his face radiating menace and humiliation. His eyes were trained on the exit closest to the Kaijo locker room, the exit Aomine had been headed towards before he noticed him.

There was an ugliness to Haizaki that Aomine couldn’t stomach, a malice, and it must have been compounded by the way Kise had played tonight—incandescently good, heart-stoppingly good, leading his team to victory in a way that honestly redefined what it meant to be an ace.

Aomine stepped forward. “If you’re thinking about getting revenge on Kise, don’t bother.”

Haizaki turned to look at him, his expression shifting slightly—curling upward and downward at once, respect and caution mixing with his anger. “Daiki,” he greeted, and Aomine hated the familiarity of it, hated that he laid claim to their shared past like this, as if it meant they had anything in common.

“If you go home quietly, I’ll let this go,” he said, keeping his voice steady but not bothering to hide his disgust.

Haizaki looked startled, as if it never occurred to him that Aomine would want to protect Kise. “Whatever, idiot,” he said scornfully. “I’ll do what I want.”

Aomine shifted, letting all the frustration of the past few days fill him. Here was a target he could take things out on, an uncomplicated asshole ripe for his rage. “If we’re playing basketball, I don’t care what you do,” he said, voice low and furious. “But don’t mess with them by doing stupid shit off the court.”

Haizaki started to taunt him, but Aomine cut him off. Don’t even fucking _try_. “You lost to Kise, Haizaki. You have no idea how much he and Tetsu have trained. Don’t do anything else stupid.”

True to form, Haizaki did—spitting taunts. Aomine taunted back until Haizaki took the bait. His lips curling, he threw himself forward, rushing Aomine, confident that he would back down.

Aomine shifted his stance a little wider, narrowed his eyes, and punched him hard in the face.

He stared at his prone form for a long moment, kicked him a little with a toe. “The fuck am I supposed to do with you now?”

Haizaki—passed out—didn’t answer. Aomine considered him for another few minutes, in case he woke up, and then went to talk to Kise.

Kuroko had told him that Kise said he wouldn’t ignore him forever, but he still hadn’t answered any of Aomine’s texts and at the very least—if Kise still didn’t want to talk about it—Aomine could congratulate him on a fucking spectacular game and then maybe convince him to talk about why he didn’t want to talk about it, and—

He stopped.

He’d expected to find Kise alone in the locker room—he liked to take savor the moments after victory in silence—but he was only almost correct.

Kise had one hand on Kasamatsu’s jaw, the other frozen in mid-air, like he was going to do something with it but had forgotten what. Kasamatsu had both hands fisted in his shirt, his eyebrows drawn together like he was concentrating, and when he pulled back—Kise’s lip parting in the wake of his mouth—he was bright red.

“I just,” he said in the face of Kise’s wide-eyed stare, “I just—wanted you to know, before you talked to him.”

It took a minute for Aomine to be able to form words through the rushing in his ears, but he finally managed an impressively casual, “Before he talked to who?”

Kise twitched, and his eyes slid off Kasamatsu to Aomine and back. “Senpai,” he said desperately, and Kasamatsu stepped away from him. 

“Later,” he said firmly, and then left, still bright red, never once meeting Aomine’s eyes.

Kise ran a hand over his face, taking a couple shaky breaths before he turned to look at Aomine again. “Hey,” he said, almost laughing, but it wasn’t quite mirth, in his voice, just a heavy, anxious kind of irony.

“Hey,” said Aomine back, and took a few steps forward. “You, uh. You remember that time we almost had sex?”

It was—maybe not the best conversation starter, but Aomine wasn’t the best conversationalist, so fuck it. Kise looked surprised and maybe a little pained but it also brought his attention back to where it should be, not slipping out the door after his captain.

“Yeah,” he said drily, “I don’t think I’ll forget it easily.”

Aomine rolled his shoulders. “At the time you—said it would be different from me fucking Satsuki.”

“Yeah,” said Kise slowly, “because I was in love with you, Aominecchi, we’ve been over this.” His voice was light, almost too much so. “I didn’t want just sex from you.”

Aomine shook his head, frowning. “It wouldn’t just have been sex. I don’t—what I do with Satsuki isn’t just sex, either, it’s more important than that.”

“More important how?” Kise asked, running a hand through his hair.

Aomine looked away from him, because. That’s not a question he would ever know how to answer, probably. He changed tactics. “Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

Kise cocked his head at him. “What,” he said, “before or after you started looking at Kurokocchi like he was the answer to some, some cosmic question?”

“Before,” Aomine said immediately, and then coughed. “Or—after, or anytime, really.”

Kise sighed and sat down on the bench. “Before, it was like—I don’t know. I was in love with you, but so was he, and I knew it, and I loved him, too, I wasn’t going to hurt him like that. Better you chose one of us freely than me confessing and leaving him behind.” He stared upward, sweat-soaked, exhausted, beautiful. “And after—well. It’s not like I knew you’d be open to dating more than one person at a time.” He lowered his head to regard Aomine sideways. “But none of us expected Kagami, I suppose.”

He meant Kuroko and Aomine and himself, when he said “us”, but he also meant the Generation of Miracles—the _world_ —in general, and Aomine had to laugh, short and sharp. He pushed a hand against his eye. “No,” he said. “None of us did.”

Kise watched him. If Aomine hadn’t known him so well he would have thought he looked tired, almost lazy, but he could see the tension sitting just under his skin, waiting—could see how nervous he was. He wished he had any idea what to say. He’d had weeks and weeks to figure it out, and he still. Just. “You—you should have said something,” he said at last.

Kise blinked slow at him. “Why?” he asked. “Why, Aominecchi, if it was just unrequited?”

Aomine stepped up to him. “Because,” he said, “it wasn’t. It isn’t.”

He leaned down. Kise didn’t pull away, and their mouths slotted together. Kise’s lips were soft and salty with sweat; he fisted one hand in Aomine’s shirt and tugged him closer and kissed back slow and fervent and nothing at all like—anyone. Not like Kuroko and not like Kagami and not even like Momoi’s impression of him. He kissed like Kise—a Kise Aomine suddenly felt he barely knew, honest and unpretentious and real.

Aomine pulled back and wiped at his lip with his thumb.

Kise, after a long moment, opened his eyes. “Aomine,” he said, and the lack of the _cchi_ was almost visceral. “Tell me you love me.”

Aomine stared at him. “What?” 

“Say it,” Kise said, voice suddenly dangerously soft. He stood up. “Go on.”

Aomine licked his lips. “Kise—come on, I haven’t even said it to Tetsu.”

“He doesn’t _need_ you to,” Kise snapped. “He knows it, he’d have to be blind not to know it, everyone who has ever laid eyes on you two knows it. But I don’t.” He paced once, twice. “I know you want to fuck me. I’ve known that since I found that photoshoot of mine in your room with your porn, but now you’re here telling me you love me and I don’t think I can believe that. Not after all this time, not with—everything else.” He turned, staring Aomine down. “Because you’re not actually even _telling_ me,” he said steadily. “You’re standing there and you’re dancing around it and you’re heavily implying and I’m sorry, Aominecchi, but that’s not good enough.”

Aomine scowled at him. “Kise, come on—“

“What,” Kise shot back, “am I not making this easy enough for you? I’m supposed to be the easy one, right? Kurokocchi is demanding that you work for his love but I’m supposed to just fall into your arms because I’m so overwhelmed that you even noticed me, is that right?”

“No,” snapped Aomine, but what he meant was _please, yes, that’s what I need, why can’t anyone be what I need_ , and Kise heard the lie because of course he did. He stared Aomine down, eyes blazing. “No,” Aomine insisted, just as emptily.

“You know what I think?” Kise asked. “I think you can’t fuck Kagamicchi, and it’s messing you up inside.”

Aomine glared at him. “What the fuck is that supposed to—“

“Aominecchi,” Kise said, his voice as solid and serious as a brick wall. “Sex is how you show people you care about them. You suck at talking, so you—you know, use your body. You’re good at it, I’d imagine.” He laughed a little. “Have. Imagined, a lot.”

Aomine smirked at him, but he felt off-balance.

Kise’s eyes flicked around his face, not quite settling anywhere. “That’s why Kurokocchi doesn’t need you to say it, because you show him all the time. It’s what you mean when you say sex with me wouldn’t just be sex, and it’s what you mean when you say sex with Momoicchi isn’t either.” 

Aomine looked away from him, staring at the floor.

“You hide it well, but sex isn’t just sex for you, ever, it’s all. Tangled up in heart.” Aomine heard him smile, heard it fade. “But now you’re falling for Kagami, too, and he’s not interested in sex.”

Aomine fisted his hands at his sides, still not looking at him. “He fucking—he does it on purpose, now, he walks around Tetsu’s place naked like some kind of goddamn—“ he cut himself off. God, he hadn’t meant to cave so easily. Was this shit really so much on his mind that he couldn’t even—

“Yeah,” said Kise. “I thought so.” He took a long, long breath, and Aomine finally looked at him, saw the absolute misery in his face. “You’re not in love with me,” he said. “You care about me maybe more than I ever gave you credit for, and that—that means a lot. But you’re here because you’re sexually frustrated and _romantically_ frustrated and I’m not going to be—a, a knock-off version of Kagami for you.”

Aomine shook his head, wanting to reach out to him but not really knowing how. “That’s not fair,” he said, “that’s not—all of it,” because it wasn’t, because behind the storm of helplessness and weirdness he felt about his new situation there was—old affection, old longing, and he didn’t know what to do with that, either.

Kise let out a sigh, half satisfied, half hurt. “But it is some of it,” he said gently, “and you’re too stupid to untangle which bit’s which.”

“I’m not stupid,” Aomine snapped. “You try and deal with this bullshit and we’ll see how smart _you_ feel.”

Kise watched him for a long moment. “You know that I would love to,” he said gently. “Both selfishly and selflessly, Aominecchi, I would take this burden and these loves from you happily, but I can’t. And neither will I add to it.” He took a step backward, drifting away from Aomine. “Better that I withdraw.”

“Kise,” said Aomine, and he stepped forward, crossing the distance between them. Kise was nearly against the lockers, looking up at him, his eyes guarded and longing and completely unfair, glimmering gold from under his eyelashes, and Aomine wanted to kiss him more actively than maybe he ever had before. “Please.” He licked his lips. “I, I need you.”

Kise closed his eyes for a long minute, and when he opened them they were steady and regretful and heartbroken. “Yeah,” he said, “you do. But not as a lover, and certainly not as a boyfriend.” He reached out and pulled Aomine’s head into the crook of his neck; Aomine wanted, somewhere in the back of his head, to fight that, but he couldn’t, just went with it, breathing Kise in. “You need me as a friend,” Kise said in his ear, “because I understand you.”

“No one understands me but me,” Aomine said, but it was weak and muffled by Kise’s shoulder. 

Kise laughed softly into his hair. “Maybe so,” he said, “but has anyone ever come closer to being you than me?”

He was shaking. Aomine wanted to wrap his arms around him until he stopped, but he didn’t. He let Kise pull away, instead; watched him wipe subtly at his eyes.

“We could still fuck,” Aomine suggested hopefully, hopelessly. Itched to have more of Kise’s skin against his hands. “As friends.”

The corner of Kise’s mouth turned up, and he cocked his head. “No,” he said. “Not—not now, anyway, that’s not something I could handle for. A long time, probably. Maybe ever.” His eyes were bright with unshed tears. “I—there are other options. For me, and definitely for you.” He smiled a little. “Go see Momoicchi, maybe she can be Kagami for you.”

Aomine shook his head. “I don’t want her to,” he said, because he didn’t, because he wasn’t—Kagami didn’t want sex, so even pretending about it felt. Wrong. He blinked slow at Kise. “But she was you for me, once.”

Kise swallowed hard. “Aominecchi.”

Aomine raised a hand to trace the bob of his throat, then stopped himself, slipping it over the back of his own head to massage his neck, instead. “You gonna go after him?” he asked, abrupt. “Your nursemaid. He kissed you, right?”

“He’s not my nursemaid,” Kise said fiercely, fiercely enough that it drew Aomine’s eyes back to his face. “He’s my _friend_ , maybe the truest friend I’ve ever had.”

“And?” Aomine challenged, to cover how much that hurt, sharp and horrible in his gut.

“And,” Kise sighed, and ran a hand through his hair. “I think we may have a problem in common, figuring out how not to want someone who doesn’t want us.”

Aomine blinked at him. “You think he’s like Kagami?”

Kise shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said, staring at the floor, and then shook himself. He looked up at Aomine with a smile—a real one, warm and hopeful and not bitter at all. It wormed its way under Aomine’s skin and made his chest feel hot. “I’m going to go find out.”

Maybe there was something Aomine could have said to stop him, something he hadn’t already said, or already—failed to say. Instead, he watched Kise go to the doorway, watched him pause. “Aominecchi,” he said softly, without looking around.

“Yeah,” said Aomine, his voice coming out tight and strange. He resisted the urge to cough—the air felt too fragile—and settled for swallowing, and swallowing, and swallowing again.

Kise looked over his shoulder at him, enough that Aomine caught the glint of his eye, the rueful curl of his mouth, the slow trace of a tear down his cheek. “Your timing fucking sucks.”

Aomine watched him go, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides, and then he picked up a basketball from the crate in the corner of the locker room and went out onto the court.

Everyone had left—the stands were empty, all of the lights off except a single row of fluorescents across the back of the gym. There was a janitor sweeping a long-handled broom back and forth across the floor, but when he saw Aomine he sighed and leaned his broom against the wall before vanishing off into some closet. Maybe he was used to this—players working out their frustration after losing games—or maybe he recognized him. Either way, he left the court to Aomine.

He spent a minute just—dribbling lazily, passing the ball around his body without even really thinking about it. His head was full of Kise’s words—at first his rejection, at first his hope, at first his hurt, but Aomine let those drain away with the tension in his muscles and focused on—the other stuff, the stuff he said because he _did_ understand. 

_Tangled up in heart._

That was his fucking problem, wasn’t it, or almost—that was his problem backward to front. Sex wasn’t tangled up in heart so much as heart was tangled up in sex, because they’d bloomed together in his chest—brilliant and soft and pink—and he couldn’t—let them be separate.

He’d never learned the language to tell someone he loved them because the first person he loved didn’t want to hear it. Couldn’t hear it, couldn’t bear to, hearing it would have made her back off from him, would have meant he’d lost her. So he’d pressed at the two feelings—love and lust, affection and desire—pushed them together until he couldn’t tell them apart, and then he gave them to her and swore it was the same as what she gave him back. And, in time, it was—in time it settled out into a comfortable sort of lust, undemanding.

He caught the basketball between his hands, spun it once, and drove down the length of the court.

It had been fine, when he was just with Kuroko, because he loved and needed Kuroko in equal measure, in equal, unbearable, _overwhelming_ measure. He loved and needed Kuroko the way he loved and needed basketball, and the times in his life when he’d lost him were the worst thing he’d ever experienced. The worst shit he’d ever done to himself, the stupidest shit.

Aomine feinted left, imagining Murasakibara, imagining Akashi, imagining Kagami in his path.

It was no longer fine.

He focused his frustration into the muscles of his legs and leapt, slamming the ball through the hoop and hanging, suspended, from its edge.

How the _fuck_ was he going to separate out two feelings that had been the exact same, his whole goddamn life?

He remembered the challenging, knowing jut of Kagami’s jaw. _Could you?_

He dropped.

+

Kagami was alone in Kuroko’s apartment when he got there. He was shirtless and had a spoon tucked in his mouth and a jar of peanut butter in his hand—one of his disgusting American habits—and he waved Aomine in with his free hand. “Kuroko’s out helping Riko-san with something,” he started, around the spoon. 

Aomine shook his head. “I’m actually looking for you.”

Kagami raised his eyebrows at him. “S’a little late for street ball.” He squinted at Aomine. “Dude, you look like shit.”

Aomine ran and hand over his face and dropped down onto the couch. “Yeah, well,” he snapped, and then stopped. He closed his eyes, because it was easier than looking at Kagami, at his mouth as he cleaned off the spoon, at the shifting muscles of his chest. “I went to talk to Kise.”

Kagami settled beside him—he felt the couch dip with his weight. “How’d it go?”

“Brilliantly,” growled Aomine. He opened his eyes. “He rejected me,” he said, as steadily as possible, “and went to make out with his captain. The one with the eyebrows.”

Kagami winced. “Rough,” he said, but there was—relief, in his tone, too. Aomine cocked his head at him, and Kagami thoughtfully put the spoon back into the jar of peanut butter. “Kuroko will be glad to hear it,” he said quietly, and Aomine got it.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Kagami raised his eyebrows at him. “There’s a first.”

Aomine smacked him in the head. “Asshole,” he said. “I mean it, I’m—I’m too damn careless with his feelings.” He remembered the tense line of Kuroko’s back, remembered his voice, tear-choked, remembered being. So certain he would never be able to kiss him again. “Always have been.”

Kagami regarded him sideways. “Maybe,” he said. “But that’s not what happened today. Kuroko really wanted you to go talk to him, just like he really wanted me to talk to Tatsuya.”

Aomine frowned. “I don’t get why.”

Kagami rolled his eyes. “That’s because you’re stupid as hell.”

Aomine leaned forward and grabbed the spoon from his hand, popping it into his mouth. “You explain it, if you’re so fuckin’ smart,” he mumbled around it.

Kagami put the cap back on the jar. “He wants you happy,” he said, and stood up. “He knows you’re making a sacrifice, being with him. He knows you want to go back to what it was like before.” He stood up, wandering toward the kitchen, still talking. “He thinks if he gives you something else you want, maybe you won’t mind so much.”

Aomine waited until he’d vanished into the kitchen, and then he said, not very loudly, “I don’t.”

Kagami poked his head back into the room. “What?”

Aomine felt his cheeks heat. “I don’t,” he said, louder, biting it out. “Want to go back to how it was before.”

Kagami vanished for a second and then returned, empty-handed. He approached Aomine slowly, his expression unreadable. Aomine shifted, crossing and uncrossing his legs, until the silence became unbearable. “What,” he snapped.

Kagami stared at him for another long moment. “I’m trying to tell if you’re high on something. Or feverish.” He crossed closer, bringing a broad palm up to Aomine’s forehead. “Like I said, you look like shit—“

Aomine knocked his hand away, glaring. “I’m not fucking _sick_ , asshole.”

Kagami still looked dubious, and Aomine worked his tongue around in his mouth. “Sleep with me,” he said at last.

For a minute he thought Kagami might laugh at him, or maybe hit him. His eyebrows twitched together, and the corner of his mouth turned upwards in a kind of incredulous amusement. But there was something else, too—an anxiety at the back of his eyes that made Aomine’s stomach clench tight. 

“Just because Kuroko’s not here doesn’t mean you should hit on me,” Kagami said slowly.

“I’m not,” Aomine snapped. “I don’t mean _sex_ , asshole, just _sleep_. Like you do with Tetsu.” He ran a hand over his head. “You’re not wrong. I’m exhausted as hell, and don’t you dare tell me you’re not tired because you can sleep fucking anywhere, you fell asleep during that rock concert we went to last month, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen you fall asleep while playing basketball—“

Kagami held up his hands. “Okay, okay, chill.” He rolled his shoulders and regarded Aomine for another slow minute. “Fine,” he said, “sure.”

Aomine licked his lips. “Good,” he said, and then stood up and led the way into Kuroko’s bedroom.

He was—weirdly nervous, and that was the stupidest thing he’d ever heard until he actually thought about it. He didn’t. Sleep with people. He slept with Kuroko, obviously, any time they could, but he didn’t, really, with Momoi—not since they were kids, because. It had seemed one of the rules for Not Falling In Love, in his head, which—which is why he’s doing it now, right? Flipping that on its head.

He took off his shirt and sat down on the bed, lifting his eyes to where Kagami stood in the doorway, watching him.

He was—he was smiling, small and soft, a smile Aomine had only ever seen him direct at Kuroko. It was—disorienting. “Well?” Aomine demanded, to distract himself from the squirming of his stomach. 

Kagami made a face at him and wandered in, getting into bed on the other side. Aomine lay down and closed his eyes, and after a long breathless moment there was warm weight against his back, skin against his skin, and Kagami draped a heavy arm over his side, pulling him back and close.

This—had been a really bad idea.

For one thing, they were in Kuroko’s bed, and being in Kuroko’s bed just sort of automatically made him a little turned on. For another thing, he hadn’t really thought through being the _little spoon_ in this arrangement, hadn’t thought about what it would be like to have all of Kagami pressed up against his back, to be able to feel his breath against the nape of his neck and his heartbeat against his spine—quick, quicker than sleep, quicker than usual, and maybe that made it a little better but it wasn’t fucking enough. 

Kagami shifted his arm and curled his warm, calloused fingers over Aomine’s hip, and Aomine threw himself forward and out of his arms to the edge of the bed, his head in his hands.

Behind him, Kagami sat up, slower. “Aomine.”

Aomine shook himself, wanting to apologize, but he was too pissed. This was where he tried to start? What the fuck was wrong with him? “Bad idea,” he said shortly.

Kagami sighed. “Look,” he said. “I get what you’re doing, and I appreciate it. But don’t force it.”

“I have to force it,” Aomine snapped, “or it’s not going to fucking happen.”

“Oh,” said Kagami, and Aomine twisted to look at him. He was sitting cross-legged, hands loose and aimless, and there was nothing different in his voice but some light behind his eyes had clicked off. “Then. Y’know. Maybe it shouldn’t.” He rolled to the edge of the bed and onto his feet. “I should—“ he started, and Aomine twisted further to catch his wrist.

“Stop,” he said. “Kagami, stop.” He dropped his eyes. “That—that’s not what I meant.”

Kagami raised an eyebrow at him, waiting and unsure.

Aomine took a breath, scowling at his own knees. “I’m not forcing—feelings,” he said finally. “Just—actions.” He looked up at Kagami. “Words. I’m. Give me some time?”

Kagami gave him a weird look. “Pretty sure we are, dude,” he said. “No one’s asking anything of you you don’t wanna give, you know that.” He came around the end of the bed to sit next to Aomine, who let go of his wrist, belatedly. “Any pressure you’re feeling, you’re putting it on yourself.”

Aomine sighed. “Yeah,” he said, and it came out bitter. “Like always.” It was just like it was on the court. He couldn’t expect anyone else to push him, to make him better. 

Kagami raised his eyebrows at him. “Not always,” he said simply, a little smugly.

Aomine glared at him, but the knowledge that he was right settled warm in his chest. “You won _one time_ , asshole—“ he started, but Kagami reached out and took his hand, and he stopped.

“You want me to pressure you?” he asked, a little teasing but mostly just. Actually curious.

Aomine licked his lips. Kagami’s hand was huge, thick-veined, so different than Kuroko’s. “Maybe,” he said, and then, “yeah. Yeah.”

Kagami stared at him for another long moment, his thumb sliding over Aomine’s knuckles. “Okay,” he said, and then he grinned, huge and wicked. “A compliment a day, for two weeks. No repeats, and they have to be real compliments, not, like. ‘You don’t suck that bad’ or some fake bullshit like that.”

Aomine took his hand back, glaring at him. “What? No fucking way.”

Kagami raised his eyebrows at him. “I thought you wanted a _challenge_ ,” he said.

“That’s not a challenge,” Aomine shot back, “that’s impossible, there aren’t even fourteen good things about you.”

Kagami sighed and stood up. “Fine,” he said. “Didn’t think you’d back down so easily, but. You’re pretty disappointing in general, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

Aomine grit his teeth. “I’m not backing down, idiot,” he snapped, “the terms are just stupid—“

“A weak excuse,” Kagami said dismissively. “You serious about this or not?” 

He said it in the same mocking, goading tone, but it—spun from his lips different, somehow, stabbed right through Aomine’s ribs and into his heart like a spear, and he said, “I am,” before he could think about it, voice too serious. “I am.”

Kagami turned to look at him, relieved and pleased and still such a _fucking dick_ that Aomine couldn’t stand it. “Wipe that grin off your smug face,” he snapped. “What do I get when I win?”

Kagami narrowed his eyes at him. “Considering this whole thing is to help you out, I think we’d better figure out what _I_ get when you fail miserably.”

“No need,” said Aomine, levering himself to his feet and stretching his shoulders. “I’m not going to lose.”

Kagami grinned even wider. “Oh yeah?” he said. “So there _are_ fourteen good things about me?”

Aomine gaped at him. “You son of a bitch—“

Kagami stuck out his tongue. “Give it up,” he advised. “I got you trapped.”

Aomine clenched his jaw and swung a punch at his head. “You don’t got _shit_ —“

Kagami tried to catch his fist but Aomine feinted at the last second, swinging his leg around instead to tangle up Kagami’s ankles, and Kagami cursed and tripped, twisting as he fell to wrap a hand around the back of Aomine’s head and bring him down with him. They landed half on Kuroko’s bed and then slid onto the floor, Aomine (mostly) on top, Kagami’s hand still wrapped around the back of his neck, and. And they were inches apart, Kagami opening his eyes slow from the wincing shock of his head hitting the floor, and Aomine couldn’t quite look at him full on, found his gaze slipping to weird details—the corner of his eyes, the slope of his nose, the bizarre split in his eyebrows.

“You can kiss me,” Kagami said, quiet and low. Aomine felt it as well as heard it, where their chests were pressed together. “You know that, right?”

Aomine did—they’d kissed before, even; Kagami had kissed him while Kuroko sucked him off in what was _probably_ the hottest moment of Aomine’s life and Aomine had kissed him again, after, to savor it. But—he hadn’t since, hadn’t known how, and now—

He almost snapped, _who says I fucking want to_ but then he managed to actually look at Kagami, at the hope in his eyes, and he thought, _oh_.

He smirked and leaned down until Kagami’s breath ghosted over his mouth, until Kagami’s lips parted in anticipation, let their lips brush—and drew back again, staring down at Kagami’s waiting face, his half-lidded eyes. “You look gorgeous like this,” he said, truthfully, and then shoved himself onto his feet in one swift movement.

Kagami remained on the floor, hands dropped useless to either side of his head. “You fucking asshole,” he breathed.

Aomine laughed at him and held up a finger. “That’s day one,” he said.

“Day one of what?” Kuroko asked from the doorway. “What are you guys doing?”

Aomine felt himself flush. He scratched the back of his neck. “Uh,” he said. “Hey.”

Kuroko raised his eyebrows at him. He looked—amused and tired, and Aomine crossed to him and tilted his head up to brush a kiss across his mouth. Kuroko kissed him back, the little curls at the edges of his lips pleased and questioning.

“I bet Aomine he couldn’t compliment me once a day for the next two weeks,” Kagami explained from the floor.

“I see,” Kuroko said, giving Aomine an even more amused look. 

Aomine shrugged at him, watching as he crossed to Kagami to give him a hand up, as Kagami leaned in to kiss him as casually and comfortably as Aomine had a moment ago, and for a split second of weird nervousness Aomine understood why girls freaked about indirect kisses—felt, somehow, that the kiss he’d denied Kagami had been passed to him through Kuroko. He swallowed.

“What happens if he doesn’t?” Kuroko asked curiously. 

Kagami looked at Aomine. “We hadn’t actually decided on terms,” he said.

Kuroko raised his eyebrows. “So why would Aomine-kun take the bet?”

Aomine scowled at him. Kagami wrapped his arms around Kuroko from behind, resting his chin on the top of Kuroko’s head and rocking back and forth a little, his voice mocking. “Yeah, Aomine-kun,” he said, “why would you take the bet?”

“You’re a piece of shit and I hate you,” Aomine snapped. 

“Careful,” Kagami warned, his shit-eating grin reappearing, “too many insults and you undo the compliment.”

“That is not part of the rules,” Aomine said immediately. “No fuckin’ way, if I have to compliment you every day I’m not gonna restrain myself the rest of the time.”

Kagami sighed, as if he was conceding a great defeat. “Fine,” he said, and wandered past Aomine, ruffling his hair on the way by. “Remember, though. You gotta mean them.”

Aomine did not turn and watch him leave the bedroom; instead, he looked at Kuroko, who was looking back, his eyebrows almost in his hair.

“What,” he said, about a thousand times less defensive than he would have been with anyone else.

Kuroko shook his head and closed the space between them, reaching up to cup Aomine’s jaw. “Did you talk to Kise?” he asked, soft.

Aomine sagged, felt as though that light touch had robbed him of all his strength, and—and that was how it always went, when he was only pretending to be strong. There was no part of him that could lie to Kuroko for long. “Yeah,” he said. “It—didn’t go so great.”

Kuroko frowned and tugged him over to the edge of the bed so they could sit. “What happened?” he asked. “He didn’t use me as an excuse, did he—“

Aomine shook his head, staring at the floor. “We didn’t—talk about his feelings for you at all, actually.” He swallowed. “He thinks I don’t love him,” he said. “He thinks I’m projecting onto him, like. Because it’s easier.”

“Projecting?” Kuroko cocked his head. “Projecting what?”

Aomine shrugged. “You know,” he said. “Feelings. For. Someone else.”

Kagami stuck his head in the door. “Oi, anyone hungry?”

“Yes, please,” Kuroko said immediately, not taking his eyes off Aomine’s face. “Thank you, Kagami-kun.”

Kagami hummed and wandered away, scratching at his chest.

Aomine held Kuroko’s eyes.

“Is he wrong?” Kuroko asked softly.

Aomine swallowed. “Not—totally,” he said slowly, and then sank backward until he was lying on his back on the bed, staring at the ceiling. “No.”

Kuroko curled up next to him, squirming up against his side and laying his head on his shoulder. Aomine ran absent fingers up and down his spine. “How come it was so fuckin’ easy for you?” he complained. “No question at all, just, this is how it is.”

Kuroko pressed his grin to the skin of Aomine’s throat. “I’m a shadow, right?” he asked. “Of course I love my lights.”

The realization that it no longer hurt to hear Kagami included in that category hit Aomine like—like catching an ignite pass, his whole body twitching with the exhilarating, incredible impact. He took a sharp, gasping breath. Kuroko shifted even closer, pressing kisses to the line of his jaw, to his cheekbones. “I love you,” he said, certain and fervent and _exactly_ what Aomine needed. “I love you so much, Aomine-kun.”

Aomine ran his fingers up into his hair, keeping him close, his throat working rapid and tight. “Tetsu,” he managed, “I—“

“I know,” Kuroko said, and kissed him hard on the mouth.

+

At first it was hard to think of things to compliment Kagami on. Not because there weren’t secretly a thousand things he privately thought were cool, or admirable, or good about him—just how to say them, how to phrase it and how not to sound dumb and not be horribly embarrassed.

He started small—got away two days in a row with _you’re good at cooking dinner_ and _you’re good at cooking breakfast_ before Kagami grabbed him by the head and growled, “I swear to God, if you say ‘you’re good at cooking lunch’ tomorrow I’ll throw you into traffic,” at which point he switched, with a little more nervousness, to physical compliments.

He wasn’t really used to complimenting people’s physical appearance without also seducing them, but Kagami looked startled and a little embarrassed every time he did so he kept it up.

He shoved himself against Kagami’s side on the couch while they played video games, pulled ahead in their Mario Kart race, and said quietly, “you’ve got amazing eyes.”

Kagami made a little surprised noise, and Aomine smirked. “Weird, shitty eyebrows, though,” he said.

“Shut the fuck up,” Kagami snapped back, and Aomine laughed.

And then it got easier, because Kagami would do little thoughtful things—did little thoughtful things all the time, buying Aomine or Kuroko’s favorite drinks and stocking the fridge with them, or doing laundry while they were out on one of their solo dates, and Aomine could just pull him aside and say, “hey, you’re a really thoughtful guy,” and appreciate the way Kagami’s amazing eyes widened at him.

Seirin was preparing for their game against Kaijo and Aomine was out to coffee with Momoi when Kuroko called her in a panic. When she’d stopped laughing, she pulled the phone from her ear. “Dai-chan,” she said, “lend Kaga-chan your shoes, okay?”

Aomine scowled at her. “What?”

“Lend him your shoes,” she said. “His basketball shoes broke and nowhere sells them in his size.”

Aomine shook his head. “Stupid giant asshole,” he muttered. “He can have them if he beats me in street ball.”

He didn’t. Aomine gave him his shoes anyway. 

On the train home he flipped open his phone. _that counts, by the way_

Kagami took a few minutes to reply, but when he did Aomine could almost hear his scowl. _in what universe is having to wear your stinky ass shoes a compliment_

Aomine snorted. _this one_ , he sent, and then _because you’re the only one i trust to fill them_

He sent it before he could chicken out, and then leaned back in his seat. Momoi looked sideways at him, her eyes knowing. “You look good,” she said. “Happy.”

Aomine blinked at her. “I–yeah,” he said. “I guess I am.”

The difference between how he felt now and the weird, twisting discomfort of the last few weeks (months, honestly, years) was—breathtaking, and he took a minute to resettle himself inside his skin. He was happy. This was actually _helping_. That motherfucker had gotten it right.

His phone buzzed. _there you go_ , Kagami said, _that one counts. words, remember, not actions? that’s the key_

Aomine rolled his eyes. _what the fuck are you, some kinda self-help book?_

Momoi peered over his shoulder, and he let her. “Oh my god,” she said, “he’s so lame. Ask him if he reads palms.”

Aomine smirked at her, and she grinned back, winking.

_satsuki wants to know if you read palms, mr. love guru_

There was a long pause, and then Kagami sent him a picture. It was of himself, also on the train; he was scowling and flipping off the camera with one long finger. Kuroko was tucked in under his arm, looking up at him sideways, his face amused and fond.

Aomine bit his lip and set it as his phone background.

 _i meant what i said about not losing to kise_ , he typed out. _the only one who can beat you is me_

He tucked his phone back in his pocket. He and Momoi said goodbye at the station. He went home alone, and for the first time in weeks he didn’t hate the silence of his own room.

His phone lit up. _should’ve saved that one for tomorrow, idiot._

+

He did end up playing whores with Kise (although when he texted him about it he was careful to spell it HORES and explain that it was an American game Kagami had taught him, the less confusion on that front the better). 

Kise was—as predicted—insanely good at it, and Aomine was pretty sure he wasn’t even particularly trying. His shots were all weird amalgamations of the talents of his friends: Midorima in his precision, Akashi in his control, Aomine himself in his speed, and there were a few times when he shifted—smaller, more compact, a kind of controlled, accurate fury in his movements. 

Aomine watched him, his hands in his pockets. “Who is that?”

Kise caught his own rebound and turned, swiping the hair from his eyes. “What?”

He passed Aomine the ball, and Aomine caught it. “That last copy,” he said. “All—small and competent.”

Kise grinned at him. “Kasamacchi,” he said. “I’ll tell him you said that, I’m sure he’ll be flattered.”

Aomine started to scowl, and then laughed. “Everybody’s tricking me into compliments, lately,” he muttered, shaking his head.

Kise looked at him sideways. “Aominecchi.”

Aomine raised his eyebrows at him.

Kise hesitated, and then shrugged. “Nevermind, it’s nothing.” He gestured at the net. “Take your shot.”

Aomine did—and made it, managing to fit his movements approximately to Kise’s imitation of Kasamatsu, enough to zig-zag his way to the net and flip the ball through it. He caught it, and turned.

Kise was standing with his arms crossed, watching him. The early winter sun lit him pale and thoughtful, washed him out into something only tinged with gold, slipped him free of all the things Aomine had known he was for so long and presented him new and clean, to be reevaluated the way everything was being reevaluated, in Aomine’s life.

Aomine licked his lips and passed him the ball. “How,” he started, and then grimaced. “How are you? The, the two of you.”

Kise’s eyes widened. He caught the ball automatically and just—held it, staring at Aomine.

“What?” Aomine snapped.

Kise’s brows twitched together, and then, slowly, bemused, he smiled. “Do you know how many times since we’ve known each other you’ve actually asked how I am?”

Aomine crossed his arms. “Plenty,” he said shortly, though he couldn’t really. Think of any, his conversations with Kise were mostly flirting or basketball talk or—or. Dealing with _Aomine’s_ problems.

Well. Now he felt like a piece of shit.

Kise was still smiling, though. “Like. Maybe three,” he said, sounding amused, “and never once about my love life.”

Aomine ran a hand over the back of his neck. “Shit,” he said. “Sorry, I—sorry.”

Kise shrugged fluidly, his eyes slipped past Aomine to the net as he thought about his next shot. “It’s okay,” he said. “I don’t really expect anything else of you.”

Aomine hunched his shoulders. “Maybe—maybe you should,” he said, “maybe—call me out on this shit, okay? I—” He ran a hand through his hair, thought about how to say this. “You—deserve good friends.”

It was true, and it was agreement with how they’d left things, confirmation that Kise had been right, that this was right, they could be this.

Kise blinked, looked at him again, and then his smile widened, pure and sweet and surprised. “Yeah,” he said. “I do.”

He took his shot, shrugging himself—mockingly, knowingly—into Kagami’s stance, Kagami’s strength.

“To answer your question,” he said as Aomine lined himself up to do the same, “we’re good.” He smiled to himself. “Really, really good.”

Aomine lofted the ball upward and found, to his surprise, that he was almost nothing but glad.

+

On the last day he nearly complimented Kagami four or five times but always stopped himself, the words sticking to the back of his teeth, not enough. It had to be an amazing one—the best of them, he couldn’t end on a shitty compliment like _you’re the most trustworthy person I know_ or _I’ve never seen anyone work as hard as you or you impress me every day_. It had to be huge. It had to be perfect.

They went to the movies—some sci-fi flick Kuroko was interested in, and Aomine spent the first half hour kicking the side of Kagami’s ankle rhythmically and trying desperately to think. Kuroko slipped a hand under the armrest to thread their fingers together, though, and after a while he brought Aomine’s hand up to his mouth to kiss his knuckles and the tips of his fingers and between the heat of his mouth and the actually pretty interesting plot of the film Aomine forgot to think about compliments at all.

The movie was nearly three hours long and when they stepped outside—Aomine complaining bitterly about the deus ex machina of the final combat scene, there was no way the villain should have gone down that easy after all that build up—Kagami clicked his tongue. “Suck it up, dumbass,” he said, and held up his phone. “She lost, and so have you.” He raised an eyebrow. “Unless…?”

Aomine stared from him to the phone, uncomprehending. The display read 11:59, and the realization hit him slow, like the curl of Kagami’s grin. His mind went blank.

“You probably only have about thirty seconds now,” Kuroko said helpfully.

Aomine met Kagami’s expectant gaze. The only things he could think of were things he’d already said, stupid superficial things about Kagami’s eyes or his skin or his smile. He kept getting stuck on _you’re gorgeous, you’re gorgeous_ , like he could repeat that first compliment and mean—everything else, too, everything that Kagami meant to him, all of Aomine’s weird unspoken thoughts about destiny and rivalry and drive, all his foolish half-formed dreams of taking the world by storm—not alone, like he’d always assumed, but with the two people who he knew would always, always make him better.

“Well?” Kagami asked.

“I love you,” Aomine said.

Kuroko took a tiny, almost imperceptible breath. The display on Kagami’s phone flickered to midnight.

Kagami stared at Aomine, his eyes wide and his cheeks pink, his grin fading from his lips. Aomine swallowed, but then—like goddamn daybreak—Kagami’s smile was back in full force. “You egotistical piece of shit,” he said, laughing, reaching both arms out to Aomine. “Only you would consider that a _compliment_ , like, god, thank you so much for condescending to feel feelings on my behalf, big celebrity basketball star like you—“

Aomine folded himself into Kagami’s chest. “Shut the fuck up,” he snapped. “It is a goddamn compliment.” He closed his eyes as Kagami fell silent, his laughing voice replaced by the crazy, thunderous beat of his heart against Aomine’s chest.

Kagami pressed a kiss to his ear. “I love you too, you dick,” he muttered, and Aomine tightened his arms around him. “And I guess—I _guess_ —you won.”

Aomine pulled back to smirk at him, his face burning bright. “So now it’s your turn.”

Kagami blinked at him. “What?”

At Aomine’s side, Kuroko said, “It’s true, Kagami-kun. Aomine-kun and I decided.” His voice wobbled, a little, and Aomine turned to look at him. His eyes were wet, and Aomine reached out to him, pulling him against his side. Kuroko went, wrapping both arms around his chest, hard.

Aomine left a hand on his head, soothing, though if he was soothing Kuroko or himself he wasn’t sure. “Terms,” he explained to Kagami, who was looking back and forth between them. “If I won, the bet passes to you. Fourteen days. Fourteen compliments.”

Kuroko said, muffled and shaky and thoughtful and teasing, “Kagami-kun is much better at compliments than you, though, Aomine-kun. He should probably have to do two a day.”

Aomine nodded, unable to stop the grin that spread across his face at Kagami’s look of pure horror. “Yeah,” he said, matching Kuroko’s tone. “Twenty-eight compliments sounds much more fair.”

“Fair?” sputtered Kagami. “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding—“

Aomine burst out laughing, and Kuroko detached himself from his side. He reached up to take Kagami’s face in his hands. “Kagami-kun,” he said, solemn. “If you lose I will be very disappointed in you.”

Kagami gaped. “You guys are the worst boyfriends ever.”

There was a moment—a chance for Aomine to deny it, a chance to keep that _boyfriend_ space exclusive for Kuroko, preserve a, a structure that had existed for so long it was integral to Aomine’s conception of himself as a person. It wouldn’t even necessarily be hurtful, to draw that line—wouldn’t mean taking back anything at all, just clarifying language, just clarifying intent. He could love Kagami and not date him, just like he could love Kagami and not fuck him. They didn’t have to be that formal about it. They didn’t have to do anything at all.

He let the moment pass.

“Yeah,” he said, and stepped forward, slinging an arm around Kagami’s shoulders. “But you love us.” He pulled an exaggerated kissy-face. “You just love us sooo muuuch, Taiga-kunnnn.”

Kagami shoved him off. “I take it back,” he snapped, “all of it, forever.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and started walking off, fake anger and real embarrassment in the line of his shoulders.

Kuroko slipped a hand into Aomine’s as they started to follow their boyfriend. “Proud of you,” he said softly, and that—more than Kagami’s smile, more even than his returned _I love you_ —made tears prick at the back of Aomine’s eyes. 

“Thank you,” he said shortly, and then looked sideways at him. “Tetsu.”

Kuroko smiled softly. “I know,” he said. “You know I know.”

Aomine licked his lips. “Can I—can I say it anyway?” he asked, feeling like a child with a new toy, a dog with a new trick.

Kuroko folded his lips together over a wider grin, his eyes so warm they heated Aomine down to his toes. “Yeah.”

Aomine grinned back. “Love you,” he said, and it was easy. “I love you.”

Kuroko leaned up to kiss him without stopping walking, their mouths meeting awkward and quick. “Yeah,” he said again, radiating happiness, and Aomine leaned down to kiss him back, the two of them weaving around the sidewalk like drunks, trading pecks.

They jogged to catch up with Kagami. Aomine circled him, walking backward and raising his eyebrows. “Race you home?” he suggested.

Kagami cocked his head, the set of his jaw challenging in that way that Aomine loved, loved, loved. “If I win, I don’t have to compliment you,” he said, and narrowed his eyes. “Ever.”

“Done,” Aomine said—started to say, but before he did more than open his mouth Kagami was running, zero to sprinting like some kind of—like—like a _miracle_ , and Aomine had just enough time to see Kuroko start to laugh before he was racing after him, cursing and yelling.

Kagami had a head start but Aomine was on fire with confidence, buoyed up with love, lighter than he’d ever felt, and he flew along the streets, swung himself around corners without slowing down at all and he’d always been faster—just the tiniest bit—than Kagami was. They touched Kuroko’s door so close to exactly at the same time that Aomine honestly didn’t know—and even more honestly didn’t care—who won. Kagami was laughing, his eyes bright with competition, and it wasn’t even really a decision, kissing him.

Kagami kissed him back, hard and thorough, until Kuroko cleared his throat.

“Is someone going to unlock the door?” he asked archly as they separated, but his face was alive with happiness.

Kagami flushed and fumbled with his keys.

Aomine slept between the two of them that night, Kagami’s arm under his head, Kuroko curled against his chest. He reached out to thread his fingers and Kuroko’s together. Kuroko shifted, his lips curling up into a smile, and Aomine pressed their hands sideways so they could feel the slow, steady beat of Kagami’s heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S DONE! Like I said in the first note, I actually wrote a lot of this chapter first, before the rest of the fic, and I'm really proud of it. Please let me know what you think! Your comments so far have been really, incredibly amazing.
> 
> The full working title for this fic is actually "Guess Who's A Fuck-Up: How Aomine Daiki ended up with a boyfriend who loves him but doesn't want him, a girlfriend who wants him but doesn't love him, a platonic friend who does both, and Kuroko Tetsuya" but I thought that'd be spoilery for those of you who haven't read the other fics. Also kinda long. :P
> 
> The only crossover scenes here are with [Breathe You In.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3445022/chapters/7553987)
> 
> See you next time as we come full circle and check in with our beautiful Seirin Triangle. <3


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